322 The Barracouta 



universally fitted with refrigerators, the safe carriage 

 of ova scientifically packed in trays of wet moss to 

 the Antipodes is a comparatively easy matter, but in 

 the days of which I write, because of the difficulty of 

 keeping the ova at a uniformly low temperature, not 

 so low as to kill the life-germs, and not so high as to 

 hatch out the fry prematurely, it was no uncommon 

 thing for a whole consignment of many hundreds of 

 thousands of ova to arrive in New Zealand or Australia 

 putrefied. And in any case the consignees were over- 

 joyed if they were able to place in colonial waters ten 

 per cent, of the living ova which had been despatched 

 to them. 



Then came the long and patient development of 

 the ova into fry and of the fry into mature fish, a 

 work which could only be carried out successfully by 

 the aid of an intense devotion to, and perfect knowledge 

 of, the business. Such a work had been success- 

 fully carried out in the upper reaches of the pretty 

 little river Clutha in Otago. Step by step the embryo 

 salmon had progressed until they had reached, a goodly 

 company of them, the ' parr ' stage of their career. 

 Then, following their natural instincts, they journeyed 

 towards the sea, and in due course reached the estuary 

 of the river, which was guaxded by a bar, as indeed 

 are most if not all the rivers of New Zealand. 



Gaily the juvenile salmon disported themselves 

 in the salt water before making their exit into the 

 vast Pacific smiling without. Then there crossed 

 the bar into the river a school of Barracouta, their 

 long lithe bodies darting hither and thither in quest 

 of prey. They met the young salmon, and, oh the 

 pity of it, in a few minutes not a solitary parr was 

 left to reward the patient watchers up the river with 

 the sight of a fell-fed young salmon returning to his 



