xc 



shallow embankments, so as to economise the water and spread it over 

 the largest possible area. From a piscicultural point of view, the whole 

 stretch of rice-fields has the appearance of a vast and admirably constructed 

 nursery. A whole river or rivulet has been turned on, a river, too, that 

 has been stocked with ova, the water has been economised to the utmost, 

 the depth regulated to exactly suit the fry, large predatory fish thorough- 

 ly excluded, the whole manured, ploughed, and planted so as to provide 

 the maximum of insect life, with the desired modicum of varying shade 

 under the growing rice, and the area of the nursery is measured, not by 

 the inch and foot, but by the acre or square mile. In this extensive 

 nursery therefore, which costs the pisciculturist nothing, the fry thrive 

 admirably, and still following their instinct, go feeding, dawdling down- 

 wards with the stream. This takes them leisurely from rice-field to rice-field, 

 and in the direction of the waste water, which of itself not unfrequently runs 

 into the river again, or might almost always be contrived so to run. But 

 at each drop from rice-field to rice-field, the cultivator places a basket, 

 made of finely split bamboos, having a wide mouth, a narrow neck, and 

 a wide bottom. It lets the water pass, but stops every single fry, 

 and what was an admirable nursery, becomes one vast trap for destroy- 

 ing the majority of the fry in the river. So highly are these juicy morsels 

 appreciated, that no peasant fails to place a basket at every outlet/'' [The 

 Madras Revenue Board consider that a fishery Act should contain, amongst 

 other things, provisions to the following effect : "(6). That no inter- 

 ference is intended, or is to be permitted, with the existing rights of the 

 people in regard to catching and retaining fish in their own fields, minor 

 channels and ponds, but that it shall be lawful for the officers entrusted by 

 law with the conservancy of fisheries to insert gratings in the head of 

 any channels leading to such fields/' 7 Thus the vast traps now existing 

 for fry, and so ably described by Mr. Thomas, should continue unchanged. 

 The Burmese were wiser than this, taxing highly the use of bamboo 

 traps and such like contrivances for capturing fish.] The Collector con- 

 tinues, " This is not unavoidable or accidental destruction, but is wilful, 

 reckless, and preventible. Some of these fry, it will be remembered, are 

 capable of becoming fish of 10 or 20 pounds in weight." [if this destruc- 

 tion ie forbidden, the Revenue Board appear to consider that such would 

 be a. grievance to the proprietors of fields, and would allow such to con- 

 tinue as vested rights : but would not that ignore the great loss to the 

 public at large in the fearful waste of animal food.] But " it would 

 seem that they have very little, if any more right to complain than has 

 the English miller. They are like each other in diverting the rivers for 

 their own benefit, and of each of them the request made of them would 

 be the same, namely, that they should do it without injury to the fish- 

 eries. The Indian farmer may, like the English miller, claim that he 

 has a prescriptive right to the water, and that it is no part of his 

 business to protect the fry. It has, nevertheless, been decided against the 

 English millers equally with the companies or persons in charge of artifi- 

 cial channels for navigation, or for supplying towns with water, and that 

 they shall put gratings so as to prevent the passage of salmon fry to 

 their destruction, and that failing to do so, " they shall incur a penalty 

 not exceeding five pounds for every day" of delay, and " a penalty not 

 exceeding one pound for every day" during which they may fail to main- 



