UNDIVIDED IN DEATH. 25 



When fishing Loch Tay in 1870, Mr. Cramp 

 saw two pike struggling and fastened together by 

 the insertion of the head of one within the jaws 

 of the other. Whether this was brought about 

 by charging at one another when fighting or by 

 both dashing at the same bait, and having got 

 up steam, had too much way on them to avoid 

 a collision, cannot be determined, but the head 

 of the smaller fish was fixed up to its pectoral 

 fins, in the mouth of the larger ; and so they were 

 gaffed through both their heads by Mr. Cramp's 

 boatman, and sent thus (undivided in death) to 

 Mr. Frank Buckland, who made a cast of them 

 for his fish museum. The two fish weighed 

 19 Ibs. 



Unwary young pickerel have been known to be 

 choked by attempting to swallow sticklebacks ; and, 

 if not completely choked in infancy, get wiser 

 possibly after what Dr. Badham calls an attack of 

 " sticklebackitis." At what size or weight does 

 esox junior become a pike ? Walton says at 2 ft. ; 

 Sir J. Hawkins at 3 Ibs. ; Salter at 3 Ibs. ; Hofland, 

 3 Ibs., or when it exceeds 24 ins. in length ; Piscator 

 {Practical Angler] says 4 Ibs. ; " Ephemera," in his 

 Handbook on Angling, 3 or 4 Ibs. ; Elaine, 4 or 

 5 Ibs. Mr. C. Pennell favours a 3 Ib. qualification, 

 at which jack " might assume the dignities of 

 pikehood." 



Mr. Frank Buckland's opinion (as often expressed 

 by him to me) was 5 Ibs. ; also that jack were infertile 

 and incapable of reproducing their species Age of 

 until they had attained the weight of at P ike 

 least 3 Ibs. ; and the fact that so many young fish 

 under this weight, or say 24 ins. in length, are 



