THE PIKE OF FABLE AND FANCY n 



ring have served the printing page so faithfully since 

 at least a black letter copy of Gesner, published in 

 Heidelberg in 1606, that we may for the moment 

 treat it seriously. Besides, did not Mr. Cholmondeley 

 Pennell, in his ' Book of the Pike, 7 give a facsimile 

 of the ring, inscription and all, as found by his friend 

 FYank Buckland in a copy of Gesner ? But it need 

 scarcely be said that it is not everybody who has 

 swallowed the story that the ring, and the skeleton 

 of the pike, measuring nineteen feet in length, were 

 during long years preserved in the Cathedral of 

 Mannheim. Unfortunately, an anatomist who knew 

 what the bones of a fish should be was mean enough 

 to enter into a cruelly scientific calculation, with the 

 result of proof that the relic had been artificially 

 lengthened to coincide with the statements. The 

 legend is that in his career of two and a half centuries 

 the monster had arrived at the decent solid weight 

 of 350 Ib. 



Amongst the fishes of fancy are a brown pike that 

 embodies the Evil One ; a phallical pike with golden 

 fins ; a pike begotten by the west wind ; and students 

 of totemism find the pike amongst the traditions of 

 the Red Indian tribes. 



The medicinal properties of the pike may without 

 offence be included in this chapter? the reader as 



