CASPIAN SEA. 



apects such that it may not easily be removed out of 

 its nlaiv, and that no fish, when once caught, may 

 have it in its power to c-scape. After they have In > -n 

 laid, tli'-n- n .ichivtQMe visited twice in the day; the 

 hook '"g the rope ; and a 



! i rough the gill., ot tin- n ,!i caught, 

 they are let down again into the water, in order that 

 they may be brought on shore alive. They are now 

 dragged with hooks to the beach, which i:> laid with 

 planks, and are cut up in the following order: the 

 lower part of the stomach, with the guts, are thrown 

 away ; the fleshy gullet is salted for eating ; the roe, 

 which lies through the whole body adjoining to the 

 entrails, is taken out with the hand and cast into tubs, 

 in which it is carried away by the caviare makers ; 

 the float, or sound, which runs along the whole back, 

 is given to the isinglass makers 5 then the cartilage of 

 the back being cut off in order that the dorsal sinews 

 may be extracted, these are washed, hung upon poles, 

 and dried in the air ; and the entrails being removed, 

 the fat adhering about the milt and to the sides is 

 scraped off with knives, collected, boiled down, and 

 cleansed, in which condition, having a good taste, it 

 is used occasionally instead of butter or oil. The 

 fish, after these preparatory processes, are brought 

 into the cellar above described, where they are first 

 laid to pickle in brine, then strewed with salt, and 

 laid up in courses one above another, to be preserved 

 for use. These belugas are frequently of a great 

 size. One is mentioned which is said to have mea- 

 sured 8,^ arshines in length, (each arshine being 28 

 English inches,) to have weighed 70 pood or 2800 

 pounds, and to have yielded 20 pood of roe. They 

 are not uncommonly taken of 1000 or 1 500 Ib. weight. 



When the shoaling of the beluga has ceased, it is 

 immediately succeeded by the train of the sevrugas, 

 which appears only once in the year, and also lasts 

 not much above 2 weeks, but during that short space 

 it is exceedingly numerous. At one vataga, with a 

 favourable sea breeze, it is usual to catch in a season 

 sixteen and sometimes twenty thousand of these fish. 

 The nets made use of for this purpose are so thick, 

 that the machines are only a span wide : 25 of them 

 are tied together, and laid at the depth at most of a 

 fathom, as the sevrugas frequent chiefly the shallow 

 places. These fishes seldom exceed 4-^ arshines in 

 length ; but their roes, as well as their sounds, are 

 much more esteemed than those of the beluga, and 

 consequently bear a higher price. The flesh is part- 

 ly salted down, and partly dried in the sun. 



Thesevrugas, ashasbeen observed, make for the bays 

 only in the spring season, which is the time at which 

 they spawn. At this period the belugas are without 

 roes, and proceed thither only in quest of prey. In 

 the autumn and the winter, those latter fish therefore 

 return thither again, either with a view to spawning, 

 or to pass the winter. These two species of sturgeon, 

 "seeking, for the purpose mentioned, fresh or moder- 

 ately salt water, repair annually at the stated seasons 

 not only to the rivers, but also to the gulfs and bites 

 "of the sea ; whereas the real sturgeon, requiring on 

 the like occasions still greater freshness of water, pro- 

 ceeds always directly to the mouths of the rivers 

 without tarrying in the bays. These fish, therefore, 

 are caxight only or chiefly at those vatagas, which 

 arc at the mouths of the Volga, and on the river it- 



VOL. v. PART n. 



self; and a sturgeon is such a rarity at the fisheries 

 on tli ' the tea, that, by a very ancient cut* 



torn, it is the property of the person by whom it i 

 drawn out of the water. 



The autumn capture for the beluga, begins in thr 

 middleof Scptunbcrandconlinucsthrough all October. 

 The winter capture of the same description of fishes, 

 begins as soon as the ice is set in on the sea, and lasts 

 the whole of that season. The same machine is used for 

 the purpose as formerly, but it is now set under the ice, 

 apertures being with that view cut in it at the distance 

 severally of 8 paces asunder, through which the rope it 

 introduced by means of long poles. Where two nests 

 are tied together, the machine is fastened to a cross 

 pole, which rest s on the brink of the aperture. For bait, 

 there is provided a sufficient stock of obla fish to last 

 during the winter, which are previously salted, with a 

 view to their preservation. The belugas caught, are 

 conveyed over the ice on sledges to the vataga, im- 

 mediately frozen fresh, and carried to Astracan. 



Other fisheries of the same descriptions with those 

 now enumerated, and these also of considerable im- 

 portance, are established on the rivers which run in- 

 to the Caspian, particularly on the Volga and the 

 Ural. The seal capture, which is carried on by the 

 more opulent part of the Astracan merchants in the 

 Caspian Sea, is found to be very profitable. Those 

 animals are here very numerous. They crawl upon 

 the islands, where the fishermen kill them with long 

 clubs. One is hardly dispatched, when others come 

 to his assistance and share his fate. They are ex- 

 ceedingly tenacious of life, and will endure more than 

 30 hard blows before they die. They will even live 

 for several days after having received many mortal 

 wounds. They are most terrified by fire and smoke, 

 and, as soon as they perceive them, retreat with the 

 utmost expedition to the sea. They become extreme- 

 ly fat, so as to look rather like oil-bags than animals. 

 The principal seasons for taking them are the spring 

 and the autumn. Many small vessels, at these seasons, 

 go out from Astracan in quest of them ; and thos-- 

 which are killed, being immediately gutted and pow- 

 dered with salt, are sent thither, where they are flay- 

 ed, and their tallow melted. A sort of grey soap 

 is here made of this fat, mixed with potashes, which 

 is much valued for its property of cleansing, and ta- 

 king grease out of woollen stuffs. The inhabitants of 

 Astracan, by salting their seals in the manner men- 

 tioned, immediately on the spot, gain this advantage, 

 that the tallow is much cleaner and better than that 

 of the seals taken at Archangel, or other places 

 where a different mode of procedure is adopted. 



Besides the great vatagas, the proprietors of them 

 have fishing huts here and there on the sea coasts, 

 where there is no capture of sturgeons, at which, 

 mostly in summer, shad and barbels arc taken with 

 drag-nets. These two kinds offish do not go into the 

 rivers at that season, but keep about the sea shore, 

 where they find a better nourishment. The shad 

 here usually weigh 8 pood, and the barbel li pood. 

 The former sort of fish are extremely fat in summer : 

 their roes are thrown away ; but of the sounds an or- 

 dinary sort of fish glue is made. 



The following is the estimated amount of the num- 

 ber of large and small fish taken annually in the low- 

 er branches of the Volga, and the inlets of the Cas- 



