CUAP. IV.] FALL OF FISHES FROM CLOUDS. 211 



side of the highway are covered with dust or stunted 

 grass ; but when flooded by the rains, they are imme- 

 diately resorted to by the peasants with baskets, con- 

 structed precisely as Knox has stated, in which the fish 

 are entrapped and taken out by the hand. 1 



So singular a phenomenon as the sudden re-appearance 

 of full-grown fishes in places that a few days before had 

 been encrusted with hardened clay, has not failed to 

 attract attentrcfn ; but the European residents have been 

 content to explain it by hazarding conjectures, either 

 that the spawn must have lain imbedded in the dried earth 

 till released by the rains, or that the fish, so unexpectedly 

 discovered, fall from the clouds during the deluge of the 

 monsoon. 



As to the latter conjecture ; the fall of fish during 

 showers, even were it not so problematical in theory, is 

 too rare an event to account for the punctual appearance 

 of those found in the rice-fields, at stated periods of the 

 year. Both at Galle and Colombo in the south-west 

 monsoon, fish are popularly believed to have fallen from 

 the clouds during violent showers, but those found on 

 r^ the occasions that give rise to this belief, 

 consist of the smallest fry, such as could be 

 caught up by waterspouts, and vortices ana- 

 logous to them, or otherwise blown on shore 

 from the surf; whereas those which sud- 

 denly appear in the replenished tanks and 

 in the hollows which they overflow, are 

 mature and well-grown fish. 2 Besides, the 



1 As anglers, the } into a series of enclosures from which 



V native Singhalese I retreat is impracticable. Mr. LA YARD, 



exhibit little expert- j in the Magazine of Natural History 



but for 

 ing the rivers, they 

 construct with singu- 



forMay, 1863, has given a diagram of 

 one of these fish " corrals," as they 



are called. 



lar ingenuity fences [ 3 I had an opportunity, on one 

 formed of strong j occasion only, of witnessing the 

 stakes, protected by phenomenon which gives rise to 

 screens of ratan, that this popular belief. I was driving 



stretch diagonally 

 across the current ; 



in the cinnamon gardens near the 

 fort of Colombo, and saw a violent 



and along these the but partial shower descend at 

 are conducted ' no great distance before me. On 



p 2 



