XXV111 INTRODUCTION. 



be removed by chemical re-agents, as lime and chlorine, but their use (unless very carefully 

 employed) is likely to leave a taint to which purchasers would object. 



The first Indian isinglass imported into England about 1840 was only valued at four shillings 

 a pound, and a second specimen at one shilling and eightpence. The samples were of two qualities, 

 the first being the sounds removed from the fish and dried by exposure to the sun : the second 

 the same substance partially prepared by being cut open, the interior membrane taken out, then 

 washed, and subsequently flattened by beating out with pieces of wood. 



The fins of some fish — more especially of the Sharks — are dried, exported, and probably 

 eventually find their way to China, where they are largely employed in soups. So large is the con- 

 sumption that from seven to ten thousand hundredweights are annually exported there from 

 Bombay. Forbes states that they sell in the Celestial Empire at £6. Is per cwt. These fins 

 are assorted into the " white" and the " black," the former being the dorsal fins, which are 

 uniformly light coloured on both sides, and are reputed to yield more gelatine than the other : the 

 " black" fins are the pectoral, ventral, and anal, the upper surfaces of which are grey or darkish, 

 the lower of a bght colour ; this variety is less esteemed than the white, and consequently 

 realizes a lower price. » 



The skins of some species, as the Hypolophus sephen, are converted into shagreen, as are also 

 those of the sharks, which are employed for sword belts, the coverings of boxes, or for smoothing 

 wood or ivory preparatory to its being polished. 



The refuse of fish, as their entrails, scales, heads, and fins, are employed for manuring the 

 cocoa-nut trees, and likewise for feeding fowls, ducks, and pigs. It is stated (Speid, " Our last 

 Years in India") that at Rosa, near Aurungabad, the finest grapes are raised by manuring the 

 vines with fish. 



The scales of some of the Cyprinida? are employed in the manufacture of false pearls. 



In forming collections of Indian fishes, the difficulty of preserving specimens when obtained is 

 great ; for in conveying them from place to place they are often damaged. Personally, I have expe- 

 rienced the same results as are recorded by Sir John Richardson to have occurred to Sir James 

 Clark Ross's collection of specimens in spirits, made during the voyage of the Erebus and Terror, 

 in which, " owing to the deterioration of the spirit in jars that were crowded with fish, and the long 

 continued action of the brine, where that liquid was employed, very many specimens entirely 

 perished, or merely fragments of skeletons could be rescued from the mass." 



There are two methods of preserving fish for collections — the moist and the dry j and of 

 these an infinite number of variations, a very short synopsis of which is here given. 



The dry method consists in simply drying the preserved skins, or in the fish being stuffed, 

 and is well adapted for large museum specimens. In many inland places in India, it is, in fact, the 

 only way in which such could be preserved, for spirit is frequently not to be had, or that which is 

 procurable is bad. The Natives of India in some places, as Madras, are able to stuff fish most 



