Note 2507 — BOOK IX. THE NATURAL HISTORY OF FISHES.

We learn from Aristotle, B. viii. c. 30, that the phycis was a whitish fish, which in the spring assumed a variegated colour. In an Epigram of Apollonides it is called “red;” and Speusippus, as quoted in Athenæus, B. v., says that it is similar to the perch and the channe. Ovid speaks of it as frequenting the shore, and Oppian represents it as dwelling among the sea-weed on the rocks. It also lived on shrimps, and its flesh was light and wholesome; while its most singular property was that of making its nest among the fucus or sea-weed, whence its name. All these characteristics, Cuvier says, are to be found, from what Olivi states, in the “go” of the Venetians, found in the Adriatic, the Gobius of Linnæus; the male of which in the spring makes a nest of the roots of the zostera in the mud, in which the female lays her eggs, which are fecundated by itself, and then protected by it against the attacks of enemies. This is probably the fish that is alluded to by Ovid, Halieut. l. 121, “The fish that imitates, beneath the waves, the pretty nests of the birds.”