FISHES IN RELIGION. 29 



and to this day the Company of the Fishmongers bear 

 the crossed keys of the saint on their arms. That St. 

 Peter's tutelage of fishes and his fief of fisheries was no 

 empty assertion of the Church, may be understood from 

 the fact that the Abbot of St. Peter's, Westminster, 

 claimed all the salmon caught in the Thames, on the 

 ground that the Saint had granted the same to him 

 when he consecrated the Church. After St. Peter came 

 St. Anthony (who preached to the fishes with such effect), 

 St. Christopher, St. Zeno, and St. Andrew of Scotland. 



St. Anthony, as is well known, the patron saint of 

 animals of all kinds, utilised his power over fishes in a very 

 meritorious manner, by calling them up from the sea to 

 listen to his preaching, and thus put to shame some stiff- 

 necked heretics of Rimini who refused to listen to his 

 pious counsels. A delightful woodcut in an old chap- 

 book depicts the saint, in the attitude of exhortation, 

 addressing a company of fishes, that poke long goose-like 

 necks out of the water to listen to him, while on the bank 

 — expressing by their gestures their surprise at the miracle 

 and, perhaps, foreshowing also their own approaching con- 

 version — stand in file the stubborn scorners of his teaching-. 



That St. Christopher was always a patron saint of fisher- 

 men is certain, but for what reason seems somewhat ob- 

 scure. He certainly lived on the river-side, for, so the 

 legend says, he earned his living by carrying people across 



(a sea-water fish) that the saint caught in the fresh-water lake of 

 Genesaret. This of course only adds another miracle to the original 

 episode. In a miracle which Jesus worked, and of which, though 

 Holy Writ is silent the Koran preserves the tradition, there descended 

 from Heaven a red table upon which were seven loaves and seven 

 fishes, and the latter tasted at each mouthful of a different Paradisaical 

 delicacy. When all had feasted to their heart's content, Jesus restored 

 the fishes to life. 



