clxxxvi 



where hilsa fish is said to be salted for export to Calcutta. The practice 

 of drying or preserving fish is not resorted to, to any great extent, either 

 for home consumption or for trade, though some of the lower classes 

 dry it in the sun in small quantities for home consumption. Some salted 

 and dried fish is imported to the division, especially to Rungpur and 

 Dinagepur, from Dacca and Mymensing. Except in Pubna, where there 

 is a large trade in hilsa fish, there is no extensive fish trade to distant 

 places in any districts in the division. The fish caught is almost wholly 

 locally consumed, though it is not unfrequently the case that, in the 

 cold season, the fish is carried to distant Jiauts and markets for sale at 

 some distance from the rivers. The supply of fish has fallen off to what 

 it was some twenty years ago. This is attributed to the destruction of 

 the fry and the young fish, and to the silting up of small rivers and 

 bheels. The supply having fallen off, and the demand being great, 

 owing to increase of population, its price has also, as a matter of course, 

 nearly doubled to what it was before. People possessing tanks are 

 generally in the habit of rearing up fish, but not for sale as a trade ; the 

 fish thus reared are either consumed, or given away to those who ask for 

 them. There can be no doubt that the destruction of small fry must 

 be enormous, not only in rivers, but in every paddy-field in Bengal ; 

 but I cannot say that I see any way to any feasible suggestions for the 

 prevention of fish-catching in the rainy season all over Bengal/' It 

 is suggested, close seasons might be applied to rivers for certain species 

 of fish, and something might be done " in the way of prohibiting the 

 use of nets of less than a certain width of mesh in rivers ; but how the 

 bamboo contrivances for fish-catching, which are in use in every paddy- 

 field, are to be put a stop to, I do not see, nor do I think it would 

 be a wise measure to attempt to do so."" 



357. The Commissioner of Orissa (June 20th, 1872) replied, " I 



don't believe the weirs affect the fish : there 

 Onssa. Opuuons of Europeans. ^ ^ m j gr?tory fish to my kno ; iedge> 



except the hilsa, requiring to pass the weirs, and hilsa arrive after the 

 freshes, when there is plenty of water, and the weirs can be passed 

 without difficulty. Ordinary river-fish remain in the deep pools during 

 the dry season ; there is never sufficient water in the rivers to permit 

 fish to migrate, except during freshes, and then the weirs offer little or 

 no obstruction. Hilsa do not remain throughout the year in the rivers, 

 at any rate not in fresh water ; they arrive in July, or in end of June, 

 with the first flood, and come up from the sea. In the dry season 

 there are no hilsa in the river, and in the floods I have no doubt 

 they get over the weirs. I have seen hilsa caught nearly 100 

 miles above the weirs, and this proves that they can, and do, get 

 over.''' The above reply, it is observed, "made regarding Ihe weirs 

 is considered by the Lieutenant-Governor to be satisfactory/'' It 

 was not accompanied by answers from any of the district officers; 

 however, as they replied in 1868-1869, I fill up the gap from those 

 reports. The Officiating Collector enquired about the fisheries, " and the 

 fishermen neither knew nor cared anything about the habits of these 

 creatures, which afford food to so large a proportion of the population of 

 Orissa, and no satisfactory statement could be compiled from their 

 accounts/' He came to the conclusion that there was no immediate 



