1898] - EGYPTIAN FISHBlilES 191 



t'ons they marry among themselves and they hold native outsiders 

 i 1 great contempt. Their pliysi(|ue is fine and their cast of coun- 

 tenance is distinctly Caucasian, indeed, some authorities have it that 

 chey are descendants of the Hyksos or sheplierd kings of Ancient 

 Egypt. 



The brackish water fisheries, as being most characteristic of the 

 country and being those with which I have been most intimately 

 associated, I shall describe at some detail. The brackish lakes, 

 beginning at the extreme eastern boundary of Egypt and going west- 

 wards are Lakes Eirdaweel and Umm Farag between El Arich and 

 Port Said, Lake Menzaleh between Port Said and Damietta, lakes 

 Bouroullos and Edkou are between Damietta and Alexandria, and 

 Lake Mareotis behind and to the west of the latter place. The two 

 first mentioned receive no fresh water feeders, and on this account 

 their sea entrances, on which they depend for their existence, often 

 become silted up and require to be kept open by the tenant of the 

 fishings. The fauna is entirely marine, so they can scarcely be 

 placed under the present category. On the other hand, Lake 

 Mareotis, although it receives fresh water from numerous canals or 

 drains, does not communicate directly with the sea, the pumping 

 apparatus required to keep the level of its waters low preventing 

 the entrance of marine forms. The three other lakes each possesses 

 a sea entrance, and is connected with the Nile system through re- 

 ceiving the drainage water and flood discharge of several irrigation 

 canals. Lake Edkou was, till it was closed last year, fished in a 

 manner similar to the valli of the Italian Adriatic. The sea 

 entrances of Lakes Bouroullos and Menzaleh remain unobstructedly 

 open and are centres of much activity when the spawning instincts 

 of the lake fish cause them to move seaward. Taking Lake Men- 

 zaleh as the type, it is shallow, its depth on an average being about 

 140 cm., but in the neighbourhood of the sea entrance, there are 

 several converging channels of a depth varying from 3 to 6 metres. 

 A current flows constantly through the entrance with a direction 

 and strength governed by the state of the tide, the direction of the 

 wind, and the inflow of fresh water from the canals. 



The fish fauna consists of a mixture of fresh-water and marine 

 forms, of which the latter predominate, and their relative distribu- 

 tion is regulated by the density of the water, which varies in the 

 several parts of the lake at different seasons. With the exception 

 of the Mormyridae, all the families of Nile fish are represented and 

 two species at least breed in the lake. These are Chromis niloticus 

 and G. menzalensis, and while the former spawns in the neighbour- 

 hood of the fresh- water inlets, the latter breeds in water as salt as, if 

 not Salter than, the sea itself. These two forms and the Silurid 

 Clarias, if we exclude Anguilla, are the constant members of the fresh- 



