76 PIKE. 



having discovered the presence of Pikes in this piece of water, a net was employed, with 

 which three of that species were taken, which weighed respectively about three pounds, two, 

 and a pound and a half; but all that remained of the other fishes which had been placed 

 in this pond were one Tench that weighed a pound and a half, and eight Crucians of about 

 a pound each. I cannot have the smallest doubt that the Pike devoured the fish that were 

 missing, and those nine that remained only escaped because they were rather too large for 

 these Pikes to swallow." — {Zoologist, 1853, p. 4125.) 



When a Pike is hungry, in that frantic state so well described by Charles Kingsley as 

 partly induced by the north-east wind, 



"Hungering into madness 

 Every plunging Pike," 



almost any kind of food is acceptable ; water-voles, rats, young ducks, little goslings, young 

 moorhens, dabchicks, and fish of all kinds enter into a Pike's food-list; besides garbage 

 occasionally; and even it is on record that the head of a swan, as the bird was feeding 

 under water, has been seized by one of these ravenous fish. Toads seem to be the only 

 creatures the Pike refuses to swallow. 



Pike spawn in March and April, and sometimes in February; Siebold gives April and 

 May; there is doubtless difference as to time in this respect. The roe is small, and in 

 canals and ponds is deposited among the weeds ; where possible, a pair of Pike will seek 

 the small bays, creeks, and shallows of the waters inhabited by them, and place their spawn 

 there, returning after the season to more open waters. The young are said to be produced 

 in about thirty days, and their growth to be rapid ; but of course growth depends in a great 

 measure on the amount and quality of food they can get. 



The size to which Pike, under favourable circumstances, will attain, is very considerable. 

 The largest on record is the one mentioned by Gesner, who relates that in the year 1497 a 

 Pike was caught in a pool near Hailprun (Heilbronn) in Suabia (Neckar-Kreis, Wiirtemberg), 

 with a brass ring fixed in the skin under the gills, a portion of which ring was still bright. 

 Gesner gives a figure of this ring, which is before me as I write ; its diameter, measuring 

 from the outer periphery, is just three inches and a half; the breadth of the margin is just 

 a quarter of an inch ; at the bottom of the ring Is a double series of round metal balls of 

 the size of large peas, three in each series, which is separated by an interval, and the balls 

 are attached to the ring each by a pedicle ; engraved round the margin of the ring is a 

 Greek inscription, easily read, the translation of which is as follows: — ^"I am that fish that 

 was first put into this lake by the hands of the Emperor Frederick the Second, on the fifth 

 day of October, 1230." On the top of this ring a smaller one was fastened, by which it 

 was attached to the fish. The six circular balls are supposed, by Gesner, to signify the 

 Imperial Electors. The diameter of the smaller ring is an inch and five-eighths ; its margin 

 is a quarter of an inch in breadth. If this story is correct, the Pike in question would 

 have been two hundred and sixty-seven years old from the time it was placed in the lake ; 

 it is said to have weighed three hundred and fifty pounds, but I do not find this on the 

 authority of Gesner. Mr. Cholmondeley Pennell, who has very accurately reproduced old 

 Gesner's figure of the ring, with its inscription, mentions one Leham, who had seen a 

 drawing of both Pike and ring, in a tower on the road between Heilbronn and Spires ; this 

 writer says that as late as the year 161 2 the water from which the Pike was taken was 

 still named Kaiserwag {}) or the Emperor's Lake. "The ring and the skeleton of the Pike," 

 adds Mr. Pennell, "are stated to have been long preserved in the cathedral at Mannheim, 

 the skeleton measuring nineteen feet ; but upon subsequent examination by a clever anatomist, 

 it was discovered that the bones had been lengthened to fit the story — in other words, that 



