BASS, Labras, a family of fresh-water and sea fishes, abundant in the United States. The sea-bass, centropristis nigricans, never comes into fresh water. Its general color is blue black, and the black edges of the scales give its surface a netted appearance; fins pale blue, the anal and dorsal spotted with darker. Teeth are set over all the bones of the month. Its weight is very rarely as much as 17 lbs. The striped bass, labras lineatus, is the rock fish of the Delaware and Potomac. Color, bluish brown above, silvery below, with seven stripes of chocolate brown. This fish in spring pursues the smelt into shal low water, and devours the spawn of the shad. Its weight reaches 50 to 70 lbs.; it is excellent food, and furnishes choice sport for the angler. A variety which has the lateral bars broken into spots is L. notatus, or the bar-fish. The black bass of the lakes, grystes nigricans, is blue-black, marked with darker bandings. It frequents all western waters
from the St. Lawrence to the Mississippi. Its weight runs to 8 lbs. It is a favorite both before and after it is caught, The Oswego bass, G. megastoma, often confounded with the black bass, is distinct by the greater size of its mouth. It is taken in the shal low waters of lake Erie. The white bass. G. multaineatus, or white perch, abounds in all the upper lakes. The grass bass, centrareltus kezucanthus, is found in company with the Oswego bass. Its weight rarely exceeds 2 lbs. The rock bass, C. atiiens, is dark copper yellow, with darker clouds; fins bluish green. It is common in the St. Law rence, in the canals, and in the Hudson. The growler, grystes salmonus, is the white salmon of thesouthern. states. Color, deep bluish green, with 25 or 30 longitudinal dark bands.