But the Gæson, which is mentioned by Archestratus, means the lake Gæsonis, which is between Priene and Miletus, connected with the sea, as Neanthes of Cyzicus tells us, in the sixth hook of his Hellenics. But Ephorus, in his fifth book, says that the Gæson is a river near Priene, which flows into the lake Gæsonis. And Archippus, in his Fishes, mentioning the pike, says—

Hermes th' Egyptian is the greatest rogue
Of all the fishmongers; he skins by force
The sharks and rhinès, and takes out the entrails
Of the Milesian pikes, before he sells them.

88. There is also a fish called the latus; and Archestratus says that the best fish of this kind is that which is taken off the coast of Italy, and he speaks thus concerning them:—

Near the well-treed Italia's verdant shores,
Fierce Scylla's strait the famous latus breeds,
Most marvellous of dainties.

But the lati which are found in the river Nile grow to such a size that they weigh more than two hundred pounds; and this fish is exceedingly white, and very delicious, dress it in whatever way you choose. And it is like the fish called the glanis, which is found in the Danube. The Nile produces also many other kinds of fish, and they are all very delicious; but especially does it produce all the different coracini (for there are many different kinds of this fish). It also produces the fish called the mæotes, which are mentioned by Archippus, in his Fishes, in these words:—

Mæotæ, and saperdæ, likewise glanides.

And this fish is found in great numbers in Pontus; and they derive their name from the Palus Mæotis. But the following, as far as I can recollect, from having been a long time absent

[[490]]from the country, are the names of the chief fish found in the Nile. The sweetest of all is the ray; then there is the sea-pig, the snub-nose, the phagrus, the oxyrhynchus, the allabes, the silurus, the synodontis, the elecoris, the eel, the thrissa, the abramis, the blind-fish, the scaly-fish, the bellows-fish, and the cestreus. And there are also a great number of others.

89. There is also a kind of shark, called the leiobatus, whose other name is the rhinè; and he is a white-fleshed fish, as Epænetus tells us in his Cookery Book. Plato says, in his Sophists—

The galeus, the leiobatus, the eel.