Chap. X.] 



BURYING FISHES. 



351 



The position of its fins, and the spines on its gill-covers, 

 might assist its journey upwards, but the same apparatus 

 would prove anything but a facility in steadying its 

 journey down. The probability is, as suggested by Bu- 

 chanan, that the ascent which was witnessed by Daldorf 

 was accidental, and ought not to be regarded as the 

 habit of the animal. In Ceylon I heard of no instance 

 of the perch ascending trees 1 , but the fact is well esta- 

 blished that both it, the jjullata (a species of polyacan- 

 thus), and others, are capable of long journeys on the 

 level ground. 2 



Burying Fishes.— But a still more remarkable power 

 possessed by some of the Ceylon fishes, is that already 

 alluded to, of secreting themselves in the earth in the 

 dry season, at the bottom of the exhausted ponds, and 

 there awaiting the renewal of the water at the change of 

 the monsoon. The instinct of the crocodile to resort to 

 the same expedient has been already referred to 3 , and in 

 like manner the fish, when distressed by the evaporation 

 of the tanks, seek relief by immersing first their heads, 



tor this purpose, has not been baskets nor pockets in which to 



observed in Ceylon. place what they catch, will seize a 



1 This assertion must be quali- fish in their teeth whilst putting 

 fied by a fact stated by Mr. E. A. fresh bait on their hook. In 

 Layard, who mentions that on August, 1853, a man was carried 

 visiting one of the fishing stations into the Pettah hospital at Colombo, 

 on a Singhalese river, where the having a climbing perch, which he 

 fish are caught in staked enclo- thus attempted to hold, firmly im- 

 sures, as described at p. 342, and bedded in his throat. The spines 

 observing that the chambers were of its dorsal fin prevented its de- 

 covered with netting, he asked the scent, whilst those of the gill- 

 reason, and was told *' that some of covers equally forbade its return. 

 the fish climbed up the sticks and got It was eventually extracted by 

 over." — Mag. Nat, Hist, for May the forceps through an incision in 

 1823, p. 390-1. the oesophagus, and the patient re- 



2 Strange accidents have more covered. Other similar cases have 

 than once occurred at Ceylon proved fatal. 



arising from the habit of the 3 See ante, p. 285. 

 native anglers; who, having neither 



