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I was enabled to distinctly distinguish its fish, and I may safely assert 

 that / never saw so many yearlings in the plains of India in such a small 

 volume of running water. In one pool I counted upwards of 20 mahaseer 

 (last season's) about 6 or 8 inches in length, and these were irrespective 

 of numerous other species of the genera Labeo, Barbus, Rasbora, 

 Barilius, and Belone. This was not merely in one spot,, but all along the 

 course of the stream, which I followed for upwards of 2J hours/' The 

 foregoing enquiry and report were written by myself in entire ignorance 

 of Mr. Ross's most interesting endeavours to stop poaching on that stream ; 

 the papers furnished me at Allahabad clearly deemed poaching fish one of 

 the vested rights of the people which ought not to be interfered with, 

 and, whilst at the Song River, I expressed my surprise at its being so well 

 stocked, and the reason given me there was, " that the fish were rarely 

 molested, owin^ to the neighbouring rural population not eating them, 

 and the small sale there was for fish in the sacred town of Hurdwar." 

 It is now clear that the reason is not due to the abstinence of the 

 fishermen, but the rules of Mr. Ross and the zemindars.] This most 

 interesting and instructive report continues : ({ The mahaseers com- 

 mence to run up about the end of March or beginning of April. 

 Like salmon and some other kinds of fish, they push their way up as 

 high as they can get ; the consequence is, that in June and July, you 

 will see ten and fifteen pound fish in little streams not more than a yard 

 wide ; these are all heavy with spawn, and fall easy victims to poachers. 

 In the hills in places where the streams run between narrow rocks, the 

 natives fasten a series of strings with sharp strong barbed hooks every 

 three inches ; a vast number of fish are destroyed in this way. The 

 hill-men also frequently poison the rivers. In the plains, at the com- 

 mencement of the rains, fish run up little streams and are easily 

 caught. When the fish have run up and spawned, the young fry 

 are caught in myriads at the outlet for irrigation water in rice- 

 fields and elsewhere. All the above kinds of poaching can easily be 

 checked; only four orders are necessary: (1) damming, turning, or 

 poisoning streams never to be allowed ; (2) weirs and fixed engines 

 to be prohibited ; (3) no fish to be caught between 1st July and 

 1st October; (4) no nets to be used with a mesh less than 1J 

 inches from knot to knot. To these might be added (5) no fry of 

 fish to be sold, and no mahaseer under 3Tb in weight. These rules are 

 quite sufficient to prevent the destruction of fish by men, and can 

 be easily enforced ; in fact, all the land-holders, through whose 

 estates the streams run, would combine with Government in enforcing 

 these rules. The penal clause need not, at any rate for the present, be 

 heavy. Rs. 50 or one week's imprisonment might be fixed as the 

 maximum punishment. I do not suppose it is within my province to 

 animadvert on the wholesale destruction of fish caused by canals, and 

 Dr. Day has pointed that out quite clearly." The Collector of 

 Seharunpore " has no remarks to offer on the subject." The Collector of 

 Meerut (February 22nd, 1872) observed that "there is no question 

 that considerable damage is done to the young fish, by the indiscrimi- 

 nate use of nets with extremely small meshes without any regard to the 

 spawning season, and in the smaller streams by the practice, freely 

 resorted to by the fishermen and others, of bunding up the streams, drying 



