SOME HINTS ON COLLECTING SPECIMENS. 397 



much information can be picked out from them. Do not be put off by 

 the feeling that this or that must be known already : even if it is, there 

 can be no possible harm done to anyone if you have recorded and con- 

 firmed it yourself, and if it is not known, the note may be of the great- 

 est value to yourself and others. 



Fishes. 



The great class of Fishes, and the closely allied Lancelots and 

 Ascidians, form the lowest group of vertebrate animals. So far as 

 the actual varieties of the fourteen hundred odd species that have been 

 described from British Indian waters are concerned, there are proba- 

 bly not a very great many more to be discovered, except amongst 

 those that inhabit the depths of the oceans around our coasts and 

 opportunities for obtaining such forms rarely come to the ordinary 

 collector. The fishes of our inland waters and of the shallower waters 

 of the coast have long ago been carefully collected and described by 

 great naturalists, first and foremost amongst whom stands the name 

 of Dr. Francis Day, whose great work, " Fishes of India", will long 

 remain the recognised standard on the subject. Unfortunately the 

 cost of this book precludes its being available to many who commence 

 work upon fishes, but Dr. Day was subsequently responsible for the 

 two excellent volumes of the ' Fauna of British India ' series. 



The opportunities for the field naturalist lie chiefly in the direction 

 of studying the life history, the breeding seasons and places, and the 

 migrations of our fishes — subjects that are of the utmost importance to 

 the economic fisheries of India. Compared with the progress of Euro- 

 pean and other countries in the way of investigation and protective 

 legislation of its fisheries, India is sadly behind the times, and this too in 

 spite of the fact that the industry is truly an enormous one, providing 

 employment for a large section of its peoples, and forming the main 

 source of food supply to a still larger number. That Government may 

 be moved some day to taking definite action in the matter of the fisheries 

 of the country is to be hoped for, and in this connection we hope 

 shortly to publish a most interesting contribution from one of our 

 members that will go far to show what valuable information can be 

 collected in a comparatively short time with only limited opportunities. 



The back numbers of our journal are singularly lacking in informa- 

 tion on the subject of our fishes. What is possible in the -way of 

 collecting field notes about the commoner fishes is instanced by those 



