THROUGH WILD EUROPE 261 



in spite of myself, for the administrator was away, 

 and I had to wait for a day or two. 



When at last he returned, and I explained my 

 desire to find a nesting-place of Pelecanus onocro- 

 talus, he was kind enough to propose that I should 

 accompany one of his inspectors who was starting 

 early the next morning on a tour of inspection to 

 the stations in his district. By this means I should 

 cover the whole, or nearly the whole, of the Delta 

 district of the Danube, and he promised to give 

 instructions to the inspector to make all necessary 

 inquiries en route of the fishermen and the officials 

 in charge of all the dep6ts. 



This was too good a chance to lose, and I lost 

 no time in getting ready for the expedition, which 

 promised to be an interesting one. 



Here, in Roumania, the fish, and all other natural 

 products, as far as I could see, are presumed to be 

 the property of the State. The fishermen are all 

 licensed, and are obliged to bring their fish to the 

 dep6ts, where they are packed in ice and sent to 

 market and sold, the men getting a proportion of 

 the sales. This system leads of course to a lot 

 of friction, and to much grumbling on the part of 

 the fishermen; but considering the nature of the 

 district I do not see how they could improve 

 upon it. If the men had to send their catch 

 to market for themselves, or through middle- 



