48 Instincts, Habits, and Adaptations 
concealed net. Another decoy is substituted and the trick 
is repeated until the showy and quarrelsome fishes are all 
secured. 
In Siam the fighting-fish (Betta pugnax) is widely noted. The 
following account of this fish is given by Cantor:* 
“When the fish is in a state of quiet, its dull colors pre- 
sent nothing remarkable; but if two be brought together, or if 
one sees its own image in a looking-glass, the little creature 
becomes suddenly excited, the raised fins and the whole body 
shine with metallic colors of dazzling beauty, while the pro- 
jected gill membrane, waving like a black frill round the throat, 
adds something of grotesqueness to the general appearance. In 
this state it makes repeated darts at its real or reflected antag- 
onist. But both, when taken out of each other’s sight, instantly 
become quiet. The fishes were kept in glasses of water, fed 
with larvae of mosquitoes, and had thus lived for many months. 
The Siamese are as infatuated with the combats of these fish 
as the Malays are with their cock-fights, and stake on the issue 
considerable sums, and sometimes their own persons and fami- 
lies. The license to exhibit fish-fights is farmed, and brings a 
considerable annual revenue to the king of Siam. The species 
abounds in the rivulets at the foot of the hills of Penang. The 
inhabitants name it ‘Pla-kat,’ or the ‘fighting-fish’; but the 
kind kept especially for fighting is an artificial variety culti- 
vated for the purpose.” 
A related species is the equally famous tree-climber of India 
(Anabas scandens). In 1797 Lieutenant Daldorf describes his 
capture of an Anabas, five feet above the water, on the bark of 
a palm-tree. In the effort to do this, the fish held on to the 
bark by its preopercular spines, bent its tail, inserted its anal 
spines, then pushing forward, repeated the operation. 
* Cantor, Catal. Malayan Fishes, 1850, p. 87. Bowring, Siam, p. 155, gives 
a similar account of the battles of these fishes. 
