Background:

This colorful print is from a guide to the Fish of the British Islands authored by Jonathan Couch (1789-1870), a country doctor from Polperro, a small fishing village in Cornwall.  Couch, an authority on fishes, also did the sketches which were finished by Alexander Lydon, with the wood block engraving by Benjamin Fawcett.   Many of the engraved plates were finished by hand.