28o CASUALS IN THE CAUCASUS 



in nondescript ragged garments, or sheepskin robes so 

 roughly fashioned that, parting company, the seams 

 let the sunshine in. 



Some of the men were armed with ancient match- 

 locks, all with kinjals, and they talked among them- 

 selves in weird gutturals with an odd sadness in the 

 drop of the sentences, like the sound of wild winds 

 sweeping across the snow wastes. 



We skirted great still reaches where the Prince's 

 retainers were wont to fish for us in wholesale fashion, 

 wading knee- and sometimes shoulder-deep, as they 

 dragged an effective apparatus made from a longish 

 piece of wide-meshed net, attached to a couple of poles. 

 After a stretch of river had been patrolled, the outer- 

 . most fisherman curved to the bank, and gradually the 

 catch was adroitly landed. It always consisted of the 

 strange-looking som, largest of the Caucasian fresh- 

 water fish, in varying sizes, and perhaps a perch or 

 two. The trout of the region, though they would take 

 any sort or kind of fly, managed to evade the net 

 most successfully. 



The hideous som grows to an immense size, and 

 has the most repellent aspect, with thick whiskers. 

 It is, I think, certainly of the pike genus. Natives 

 say that its average length of years is seven hundred, 

 and they profess to be able to tell the age of each som 

 by its teeth. 



We often tackled youngsters of two hundred or so 

 for dinner, and found them quite tender, if no great 

 treat. 



The som, by reason, I suppose, of its girth and 



