HANDBOOK 
OF INDIAN FKESH-WATEB FISHES. 
CHAPTER I. 
ON ICHTHYOLOGY IN GENERAL, AND THAT OF THE INDIAN 
FRESH WATERS IN PARTICULAR. 
Ichthyology, or the Study of Fishes, is one of the 
least popular branches of Natural History ; the reason 
being probably that the element in which fishes 
live, prevents their peculiarities and habits being 
brought so prominently before our every-day notice 
as are those of creatures living on dry land. 
Many people are led by the beauty of flowers to 
direct their attention to the study of botany, or by 
the cheerful songs and bright plumage of birds to 
investigate their natural history. Many a time has 
the acquisitiveness of childhood, directed at first to 
the collection of butterflies, or birds’ eggs, ripened 
into the scientific inquisitiveness of later years, and 
made itself manifest in due course of time through 
the patient labour of an ornithologist or an ento- 
mologist. 
B 
