THE PIKE OF FABLE AND FANCY 7 



would not have been absolutely improbable ; the 

 story would, therefore, be naturally converted into a 

 country legend and passed down from father to son. 



History honours the pike more perhaps than 

 any other of its freshwater congeners, more than the 

 Salmonidse and more than the carp, which is under- 

 stood to have been introduced into England during 

 the Middle Ages, and finds frequent mention in 

 Elizabethan times. Historical footmarks, however, 

 are often somewhat uncertain, and must not be taken 

 for more than they are worth. 



In matters of this kind one always turns to the 

 Rev! C. D. Badham, M.D., who so frankly announces 

 (' Prose Halieutics, or Ancient and Modern Fish 

 Tattle') that his aim is to treat of fish ichthyo- 

 phagously, rather than ichthyologically, and to give, 

 not fish science, but fish tattle. Let it therefore be 

 noted that, in his chapter on the Esocidse or pikes, 

 he broaches the conjecture that the sacred fish, the 

 oxyrhynchus of the Nile, supposed to spring from the 

 wounds of Osiris, was the true ancestor of the pike ; 

 hence an Egyptian sect which would not touch any 

 fish taken by a hook, because they paid special 

 deference to the oxyrhynchus. The pike has evi- 

 dently been made a subject of mystery and wonder 

 from the beginning. Did not a famous Goth die of 



