38 BRITISH FRESH-WATER FISHES 
female is enormously prolific, some individuals containing 
upwards of three millions of eggs. Frank Buckland 
weighed the ovaries in a female sturgeon, g feet 6 inches 
long, taken in June 1877 at Chepstow, on the Wye. The 
weight of this fish was 34 cwt.; that of her eggs 27 lb. 
The collection of the spawn of this and other species of 
sturgeon before it is shed, and its conversion into caviare, 
form an important summer industry near the mouths of the 
great rivers of Eastern Europe. The most important scene of 
operations is at Rubinsk, on the Volga, where as many as one 
hundred thousand people collect, it is said, in spring, and await 
the approach of the fish. Of this, notice is given by an out- 
look upon a height, and as soon as the shoal is within the 
channel, nets, spears, and gaff-hooks are set to work, and the 
carnage begins. Thousands of these great fish are sometimes 
landed in a single day ; the caviare is taken out, washed in 
vinegar, and spread upon boards in the open air. Then it is 
vigorously salted by hand-rubbing, pressed in bags and packed 
in kegs for the market. In Russia it is very largely consumed 
as an article of diet, carrying the common people conveniently 
over the three periods of fasting; but in this country it is 
only known asa superfluous savoury for jaded palates. The 
flesh is said to be wholesome and palatable, being described 
as resembling a compound of veal and eel, with a flavouring 
of lobster. The air-bladder is substantial, and is carefully 
dried by the fishermen to be sold and converted into isinglass. 
Altogether the sturgeon is a valuable fish economically, and 
vast though the numbers be of the several species frequenting 
Russian and Asiatic waters, the ruthless extent to which they 
are slaughtered at the spawning season must eventually tell 
its tale upon the race. Mr. Seeley states, but does not cite 
any authority, that in the middle of last century “ it was rare 
to see a fish in the Vienna market of less than 100 lb., and 
now (1886) only very small ones are caught.”* 
* The Fresh-Water Fishes of Europe, p. 383- 
