CHAP. in. Ma/iseer's Preference for Rocks. 35 



Mahseer, for the Mahseer is undoubtedly a Highlander, clinging to 

 rocky mountain rivers, and, as a general rule, straying but a slight 

 way from the base of the hills into the plains, and straying chiefly where 

 the rock continues. The reason I assign for this is that in most places 

 in the tropics it is only the presence of solid rock that affords positive 

 security against a river dwindling in hot weather below the level of the 

 rock over which a pool finds its exit. I say in most places, as some 

 rivers are swollen in the hot weather by melting snows. It is also 

 among rocks that crabs and shell fish most abound, and there are fish 

 that have suctorial discs by means of which they are able to attach 

 themselves to rocks, and, so adhering, to hold their own against 

 mountain torrents that would otherwise wash them down, and such fish 

 thus remaining in the habitat of the Mahseer, afford, I think, no 

 inconsiderable portion of their food. Instances of adhesive power are 

 familiar to everybody in the limpet, snail, and foot of the common 

 house fly, as well as in plant life, and in fish in the head of the remora 

 (Echends remora} by which it attaches itself to the side of a shark, cod- 

 fish, or vessel ; and it may interest the observant angler to notice 

 varying adaptations of the same property in several Indian fish, in the 

 mouth, on the chin, on the thorax, at the pectorals, and I have been 

 struck by the numbers in which one of these types of fish, Discognathus 

 lamta, abounded amongst the rocks. This fish was also of convenient 

 size to form Mahseer food, running as it does to about eight inches in 

 length, but more ordinarily found at from four to six inches long. 

 Where these fish and other congenial foods abound it is intelligible that 

 the Mahseer should run to size, and delight to stay. 



We hear of captures of fish weighing more or less about 100 Ibs., 

 and I have in my possession two heads of Mahseer, caught with a night 

 line by, and given me by, Mr. G. P. Sanderson, author of " Thirteen 

 Years among the Wild Beasts of India," a book that every sportsman, 

 old or young, must be interested in, and most, even old hands, may 

 profit from. Young hands should not essay heavy game without having 

 read it. Concerning the weight of these fish, he wrote me : 



"As to my big fish I put it down at 150 Ibs., the other 50 have been 

 added in the telling. I had no means of weighing it but I found it was 

 as much as I could lift a couple of inches from the ground by hugging it 

 in my arms ; no one but a big Mussulman peon in camp could do as much 

 as this. I imagine that a man of 1 1 stone should have no difficulty in 



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