Major Gen. Hard wick e on the Goramy of India. 309 



Art. XXXIX. Observatiofis on the Goramy of India. By 

 Major Gen. Hardwicke, FM.S., 5jc., in a Letter to N. A. 

 ViGOKs, JEsq. 



My dear Sir, 



In the 14th number of your Zoological Journal is a paper from Dr. 

 Hancock of Demerara, on the Fishes, &c. of that settlement, in which 

 he remarks on habits evinced by some fishes for the preservation 

 of their young: on this subject I feel an interest, having myself, during 

 a residence of some months at the Isle of France, witnessed a similar 

 propensity in fishes found there, quite in accordance with the fact 

 related by that gentleman. In the tanks and fresh v^^ter preserves 

 the proprietors breed a fine fish, long since imported by French 

 navigators from China and Batavia; it is known under the name of 

 Goramy, and is the Osphronemus Olfax of Commerson, and Trichopus 

 Goramy of Shaw's Gen. Zool. v. iv, p. 388. It is completely natu- 

 ralized in the island, and having multiplied to a vast extent, is considered 

 by the inhabitants an important acquisition, and is very deservedly 

 esteemed by every one who has eaten of it as one of the best fishes of 

 the country. The singular habits of this fish must, in the breeding 

 season, have been often observed, for at this time they frequent the sides 

 of the tanks, which afford shelter from the quantity of grass growing 

 about them, the culms of which trail and stretch several feet 

 into the water, and give cover to the operations going on, while 

 the Goramy is busied in completing the deposition of its 

 spawn. They are for some days seen very active, passing in and out of 

 the grassy cover, and in some places thickening it, by entangling the 

 trailing shoots, and forming what is commonly considered the spot 

 under which the deposit is made. I was not able to satisfy myself as 

 to the manner in which the spawn of these fishes was disposed of, but 

 they continued to watch with the most active vigilance the margins of 

 the spot which they had selected and prepared; driving away with vio- 

 lence every other fish which approached their cover. From the time 

 I first noticed these operations about one month had elapsed, when one 

 day I saw numerous minute fishes close to the margins of the grass. 



