1839.] On Isinglass in Polynemus sele, Buck. 205 



Although the sound, or natatory vessel is the part of the fish that 

 would afford the principal inducement to form fisheries, one of the 

 obligations that speculators should be obliged to enter into with the 

 Government is, to cure all parts of such fishes as might be taken for 

 their sound. Considering the scarcity of fish in many parts of India, 

 and the great, I may say unlimited demand for it in some parts of the 

 country even when badly preserved, as well as the excellence of the flesh 

 of all the Polynemi, the curing of these fishes might prove no less pro- 

 fitable to the parties themselves, than it would unquestionably be to the 

 country. I was happy to find the attention of the Royal Asiatic Society 

 directed to the subject of curing fishes in India by Dr. Cantor, (vide Pro- 

 ceedings, 2 1 st April, 1838) but a something was then wanting to be known 

 in order to give a direct inducement to the undertaking.* I therefore 

 regard the discovery of the Ichthyocolla of commerce in one of the larger 

 Polynemi of India as a circumstance eminently calculated to direct at- 

 tention to a promising and almost unlooked for source of enterprise. We 

 first of all require to know whether more Polynemi than one afford it, 

 and to be fully acquainted with the habits and the methods already em- 

 ployed for taking such as do. Polynemus sele, Buch. is the species I exa- 

 mined and found to contain it ; but this species is supposed to be a variety 

 only of Polynemus lineatus, which is very common on all the shores to 

 the eastward ; it therefore becomes a question of some importance to 

 determine whether P. lineatus yields the same valuable article, and if it 



* Should Dr. Cantor still be in London, I would recommend those who 

 may be interested in the important question of Isinglass to consult him, as 

 no one is so competent to afford information regarding the fish by which that article 

 is yielded in India. He will, I am confident, on a re-examination of his notes 

 regarding the Polynemi, readily distinguish those with large sounds, and be able 

 to afford more valuable information regarding their habits, and the quantities in which 

 they are procurable, than could be expected from any one who had not devoted his 

 thoughts to the subject, during a survey of the place in which these fishes occur, I am 

 not sure that the species of Polynemus Dr. Cantor particularly refers to in his paper 

 as the Salliah, or Saccolih, is not the very fish that affords Isinglass ; if so, it appears to 

 be considered by Dr. Cantor as a new species, and his notes will probably afford all that 

 it is essential to know regarding its habits. Thus, as Sir J. E. Smith somewhere obser- 

 ved, " the naturalist who describes a new species, however trifling it may seem, knows not 

 what benefit that species may yet confer on mankind." 



In an interesting account of Kurachee by Lieut. Carloss, read at the last anniver- 

 sary Meeting of the Bombay Geographical Society, cod sounds and shark's fins are 

 mentioned among the exports from that place, and fishing is said to be carried on to a 

 considerable extent along the coast of Sinde. As however the Cod, Morrhua 

 vulgaris, Cuv., is quite unknown in the Indian Seas, the species from which the 

 sounds alluded to by Lieut. Carloss are taken are no doubt Polynemi, the larger 

 species of which are sometimes called by the English, Rock-Cod. It will be curious to 

 learn if the Chinese have monopolised this trade on the coast of Sinde as well as 

 in the Hoogly. 



