46 NATURAL HISTORY. 



bodies sticking up in the water like the piles of a Swiss lake dwelling. The fisherman is armed 

 with a pole, which is from twenty to sixty-five feet long, and terminates at one end in an iron 

 rake. This instrument is put down through a hole in the ice, and the Sturgeon is speared. When 

 one is caught the pole vibrates in the fisherman's hands, and he brings his capture to the surface. 

 Sometimes days pass without a fish being taken, but often as many as ten may be landed in a 

 day. On the Ural River 4,000 Cossacks in two hours have taken 40,000 roubles' worth of fish. 



In summer fishing a portion of the river is hired from the landowner by the fisherman. He 

 engages assistants, who may be Russians, Greeks, Tartars, Moldavians, or Poles, and provides boats 

 and all requisites for the work, and builds large huts roofed with rush for the accommodation of his 

 people, as near to the river as may be, but so placed as to escape floods. Each hut sleeps about 

 twenty men. Salt is there stored in barrels, and mills are set up to grind it. The fish are captured in 

 nets. If fishing is successful the men fare well ; but usually their meals are of fish. A mast is set 

 up on the bank with a look-out at the top, and here a man is placed to watch and give notice when 

 the Sturgeon are seen coming up the river. Thoxigh often met with in the sea, the Sturgeon ascends 

 rivers to deposit its eggs. Their numbers in many of the Russian rivers are almost incalculable. 

 At Rubinsk, on the Volga, in the Russian government of Yaroslav, the fisheries draw together in 

 spring and summer a hundred thousand people, who work continuously, and disperse to their homes 

 in winter. When the fishing has been intermitted for a day the Sturgeons have been known to 

 completely fill a river 360 feet wide and 28 feet deep, so that the uppermost fishes appeared with 

 their backs above the water. Fifteen thousand have been taken in a single day. They occur in 

 incredible multitudes in the Caspian, and are numerous in all the rivers of the south of Russia. 



The Sturgeon is also valued for its air-bladder, which is a large simple bag that opens into the 

 gullet. This is believed to enable the fish to vary the quantity of air which it contains, so as to 

 influence the density of its body. The air-bladder is converted into isinglass. After being washed 

 the bladder is turned inside out and dried. The internal membranes are then easily detached. It is 

 again moistened and hung in the shade, and afterwards cut into strips, which are stretched on the bark of 

 a tree to dry. The best isinglass is yielded by the Sterlet and by Acipenser huso. The Common Stur- 

 geon of British seas (Acipemer sturio] is widely distributed over the world, being found throughout 

 the Mediterranean and all round the western and northei-n shores of Europe, and along the eastern 

 coast of North America. It is frequently taken in the Thames, but does not often reach a greater 

 length than eight feet. A specimen eight feet six inches long, taken in the Findhorn, in Scotland, 

 weighed 203 Ibs. Pennant mentions an example caught in the Esk that weighed 460 Ibs. In the 

 Rhine it sometimes ascends to Mainz, and occasionally reaches Basel. It is also found in the Weser, 

 Elbe, Moldau, Oder, and Vistula. The flesh is white and firm, and has a flavour that may be 

 described as combining that of veal and lobster. It is often salted and preserved for winter use. 

 Though an excellent fish, it never commands a high price in the London market. Yarrell 

 mentions that the stomach of one caught in the Tay w.is found to contain an entire sea mouse, the 

 Aplirodita aculeata. Couch expresses an opinion that worms are probably their favourite food, but 

 quotes a statement from an American newspaper that a lady's riding-whip, mounted with silver and 

 twenty-one inches long, had been found in the stomach of a Sturgeon of moderate size. The snout 

 is pointed. The barbels vary in position, being sometimes in front of the middle line between the 

 eye and the end of the snoxit, and sometimes behind it. The dorsal shields, which are large, extend 

 in the middle line of the back between the head and the dorsal fin. The lateral shields are as few as 

 in any known species, vaiying from twenty-six or twenty-seven in young specimens, to twenty-nine or 

 thirty-one in the adult. The skin is rough, with small star-shaped ossifications, which are arranged 

 in more or less regular oblique series. 



The Acipenser huso is a larger fish than the Common Stm-geon, reaching a length of twenty-five 

 feet and a weight of 1,200 Ibs. Its appearance is smoother than the Common Sturgeon, for though 

 it also has five rows of angular scutes, extending down the body, each plate is smaller. There are 

 about a dozen dorsal shields and forty to forty-five lateral shields. Some of the larger specimens 

 have been found, according to Shaw, entirely destitute of armour, and with the skin smooth and slimy, 

 so that the plates appear to drop off" in old age, much as the hair sometimes drops off in man. The 

 snout is short and three-sided, of a yellowish-white colour. The upper side of the body is dark 



