August i , 1890.] 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST, 
107 
by the editor of the series, Mr. W, T. Blanford, who 
apologises for possible mistakes or omissions, but 
his nama is a guarantee that the work has been as well 
done as it could be. 
It would not be an easy task for ns to criticise from a 
scientific standpoint, the work of one who was Jiici/t? 
princeps in his subject, and happily it would be quite 
out of place to attempt such a thing in these columns. 
We have to consider the book from the point of view 
of those in this country who will make use of it, and if 
the number of Anglo-Indians who concern themselves 
about fishes (as distinguished from fish) is unfortunately 
very small, nothing is more likely to increase it than 
a clear well written manual, not too bulky to carry 
about, and not too costly to buy, which will enable any 
one, with a little trouble to indentify and name the 
most important or remarkable forms which may come 
under his observation. With such a help we venture 
to think that many will be tempted to take up a 
subject which in point of intrinsic int^-rest is scarcely 
second to any. A visit to the neatly kept little collection 
in the rooms of the Bombay Natural History Society 
will convince any one that whether the cast of his miiA 
iucliues him to the beautiful, the strange or the gro- 
tesque, there is a boundless field of interest before him 
in the fishes of India. And if we turn from the 
esthetic or curious to the purely utilitarian aspect of 
the subject, it must be admitted that the study of fishes 
is beyond all question of more importance to mankind 
than any other branch of natural history. It is difficnlt 
HOW TO GAIN IN WEIGHT. 
Albumen (t.r., materials like meat, gluten, casein, 
white of egg, &c.) is the food which makes flesh, 
and a certain amount of it is made up in the system 
every day, no matter whether any of it is taken or not, 
and no matter whether work is done or not. It 
seems, then, that albumen is most closely associated 
with the vital processes, and a man will die sooner 
when deprived of meat than of any other food. 
Now, to increase the flesh a full supply of such 
food as meat, gluten, &c., is absolutely indispensable, 
and, if it be given with plenty of fat and starchy 
or saccharine food, will increase the weight. In 
low states of disease the most useful food is meat, 
but as the ordinary meat-teas do not contain the 
nutritious part of the flesh, zymme should be em- 
ployed to digest out the insoluble ingredients. 
A practical question is, — Why do people who are 
taking a goodly amount of cod liver oil grow thin ? 
It is because they take too little meat. To do most 
good, oil should be combined with farinaceous food, 
as butter on bread. The endurance of fat-eating 
people is proverbial, and no other food will yield the 
force that fat will. Therefore it is that in wasting 
diseases recourse is had to cod liver oil. Because 
the oil has been given as a medicine it has aftener 
disagreed than it would otherwise have done. 
The new form of cod liver oil may be counted 
among the more recent medical innovations. For- 
merly it was the custom among physicians to pre- 
scribe this oil in emulsions. These emulsions were 
manufactured with alkalies, which, with essential 
oils, made them soapy or heavy, and, therefore, 
bad for the stomach. Now it is the order of the 
day to give cod liver oil with a food, suoh 
as malt extract, and not with drugs. Con- 
sequently, a revolution has taken place in the 
dietetic treatment of consumption, scrofula, cfee. 
The initiative of all this was the discovery that 
cod liver oil could be dissolved in a good malt extract, 
and the Kepler Solution of Cod Liver Oil in Extract 
of Malt is now pregcribed by physicians everywhere. 
It will fatten where cod liver oil would do no good, 
and where the person does not seem to be gaining 
so fast as is desired, see that plenty ui meat is allowed, 
and success is morally certain ; that is to say, there 
will be increase in flesh and fat, consequently, gain 
io weight. — “ Health, “ Loudon. 
to realise the extent to which the people of this country 
depend upon the never-failing harvest of the sea. All 
down the coast of this Presidency where rice is the only 
grain in use, and beef involves damnation, and mutton 
can scarcely he had, all except the highest castes of 
natives subsist largely on fisli. In Oanara, even the 
Brahmins, though they may not willingly avow it, are 
well known to resort very freely to a diet, which io 
almost the only alternative from rice congee and coco- 
nuts. Besides what is eaten in a fresh state, enormous 
quentities of fish are salted or snn-dried, or cured with 
salt-earth and exported to other parts of India or 
sent up the Ghauts for consumption inland. Pish 
cured by simple exposure to the sun heoumes, as most of 
us have bad occasion to know, highly aromatic, and is 
much esteemed by the natives as oomliining the qua- 
lities of nutritious food and an appetising oondiment.* 
mabomedan sailors seem scarcely able to imagine that 
life can be sustained without it, and all who love 
to go a-sailing in Bombay harbour on a balmy summer 
evening soon learn to shun tbe leeward of the native 
anchorage at the time tbe molles sdbai of the Arab 
bugealows are preparing their evening meal. Along 
with the fish, which are dried for food, are vast quan- 
ities of very small fry, which are sold by the maund 
for manure. Then there is a considerable trade in the 
fins and tails of the shark-tribe, which yield gelatine, 
and are much prized by that eccentric epicure, John 
Chinaman. Finally, fish oil is manufactured on the 
coast more extensively than is generally known. There 
used to be a factory at Calicut for making oil from fish 
livers, which was under Government management. At 
this factory according to Dr. Day, no liver under 40 lb. 
weight was accepted, and he mentions one single liver 
which weighed 290 lb. Who can forbear to sympathise 
with that fish ? 
So far we have referred only to marine fisheries 
but every river in India, large or small, is incessantly 
worried with nets and weirs and traps, and here it is 
that tbe knowledge of the ichthyologist becomes of most 
value in detecting and devising means for counteracting 
the ruinous results of ignorant selfishness. For many 
of the fishes most valuable to man, like the salmon 
in Europe, spawn in fresh water and annually ascend 
rivers and streams for the purpose. In the sea they 
are only casually within the reach of man, but when 
they come into the rivers they are at his mercy, and 
he has none. He builds weirs and dams which render 
it impossible for any spawning fish to go up the water 
or else he contrives arrangements of nets which abso- 
lutely exterminate the fry as they come down. The 
wanton mischief done in these ways in India baa been 
incalculable. The remedy is generally very simple 
when the habits of each species are properly understood. 
Weirs intended for purposes of irrigation can be ren- 
dered harmless by “fish ladders,” which allow the fish 
to ascend at spawning time, and by forbidding the use 
of nets with meshes below a certain size, small fry, 
which are useless for food, can be saved and allowed 
to grow. It is possible, also, to do much good in a 
positive way by stocking waters with the most valuable 
kinds of fish, and taking measures, as far as possible, 
to exclude predaceous species. The attention of Gov- 
ernment has lately been drawn to the matter, chiefly 
through the influence of men like Dr. Day and the 
well-known author of “The Bod in India”; but as far 
as this Presidenoyt is concerned, we do not know that 
anything has been done beyond “inviting opinions.” 
At any rate, there is very much yet to do, and since 
accurate knowledge must be the basis of every sne- 
cessful measure, every Englishman in this country who 
turns his mind to the habits of its fishes may assure 
his conscience that he is serving his generation. 
There remains the domestic side of the subject and 
this must not be passed over. We ought to know 
more than we do about the various kinds of fish which 
come to our table or which might come there. It is a 
sad fact, too characteristic of tbe Englishman in India, 
that of all the edible fishes to be had in the Bombay 
market there are only two for which we have yet 
* A diet of such fish has been adduced as one of 
the chief causes of leprosy. — E d. T. A. 
I Bengal. — E d. T. A- 
