packed in the way now usual ; experiments are, however, 

 insufficiently advanced for record and await the coming 

 hot weather. 



It has, however, been proved by numerous ex- 

 periments that fish, well cleaned and soaked for a few 

 minutes in weak brine with a slight admixture of a 

 boric preservative will keep perfectly up to at least 24 

 hours without the ttse of ice even in March, especially if 

 wrapped in special paper ; Soiling's paper has been 

 tried but vegetable parchment has proved better, and 

 ordinary " butter paper " was practically as good as the 

 latter and much cheaper. The boric preservatives 

 (Keeps and Arcticanus) are absolutely innocuous even 

 when taken into the system in considerable doses ; the 

 recent British Departmental Committee on Preservatives 

 expressly suggest 0*5 per cent of boric acid as permissible 

 even in such foods, e.g., butter, potted meats, etc., as are 

 taken bodily into the system, whereas in the case offish 

 less than this percentage is used and then only as a mere 

 detergent and antiseptic bath, little of which penetrates 

 the tissues and the whole of which is extracted in the 

 usual course of soaking and cooking. If, as shown, the 

 use of these harmless preservatives, even in such minute 

 quantities, entirely prevents taint for 24 hours, then the 

 up-country consumer can obtain fresh fish at cheap rates 

 at all events for much of the year, and above all, free from 

 the deadly ptomaines and toxins of incipient decomposi- 

 tion, a stage in which much of the " fresh " fish at present 

 arrives a few miles from the coast. Even when sent in 

 ice the fish is frequently uneatable — experto crede — and 

 a slight antiseptic wash will greatly improve its travelling 

 powers. The precise details and methods are being 

 separately reported, but I may say that in some cases in 

 March, fish caught during the day were treated at 4 r.M., 

 packed in simple parcel papers, taken without ice by rail 

 throughout the night, and eaten, e.g., at Yercaud, abso- 

 lutely fresh and good, at noon next, and were also good 

 on the following day, if cooked soon after arrival. In 

 the curing yard they were kept for more than 24 hours 

 without the slightest sign of taint appearing. 



The "Hislaire" process of preserving fish by 

 " Sterilisation" has also been tried, probably for the first 

 time in India. This was well spoken of in 1907 when. 

 I was in England and I then obtained useful results, 



I -A 



