458 INDIAN CYPRINIDZ. 
portance as in India, where most of the domestic animals which in Kurope 
afford the principal food, as the ox, swine, poultry, &c. are rejected by a 
large proportion of the people. 
Throughout the Mysore country, as well as in many of the western pro- 
vinees, large tanks or reservoirs occur, many of them from three to thirty miles 
in circumference, and being indispensable for irrigation, may be supposed to 
be nearly universal in all populous districts not watered by rivers. These re- 
servoirs are considered by the Hon’ble Colonel Morison C. B.* as among the 
greatest national monuments to be found in India 
They are capable, according to Buchanan,+ of supplying water for from 
eighteen months to two years, and thus of maintaining the surrounding 
crops should no rain fall within that period. 
They are drained by an ingenious system of sluices and aqueducts of the 
most simple, but complete construction, which afford a perfect control over the 
distribution of the water. During the dry season they are all pretty much 
exhausted, and may, if necessary for repairs, be left perfectly dry. This would 
afford an excellent opportunity for destroying crocodiles and all the various 
destructive fishes, sparing only the more profitable kinds, which are limited to 
two or three species only ; and by repeating this operation for several seasons, 
or as often as may be necessary, all but those we wish to propagate would 
soon be exterminated. 
By a wise law of nature, the carnivorous animals of every class are less 
prolific than the harmless, and may therefore be the more easily subdued. 
Nearly all the destructive fishes are viviparous, bringing forth compara- 
tively few young ; whereas, the more profitable kinds, or those which should 
be the object of our care, are all oviparous, and bring forth their young from 
spawn. 
* To whom I am indebted for many particulars regarding them. 
+ See his Journey in Mysore. 
