Vlll 
INTRODUCTION. 
that period on the fishes of the Oriental Seas. Since then no individual work on the ichthyology 
of the Seas of India has been produced, with the exception of one in 1834 by Bennett, describing 
thirty fishes of Ceylon. Dr. Hamilton Buchanan, published in 1822 The Fishes of the Ganges, in 
which 269 fresh water and estuary species are given : Gray and Haedwicke’s magnificent Illustrations 
of Indian Zoology, commenced in 1830, were never completed : even Colonel Sykes’s Report to the 
Court of Directors of the East India Company, accompanied by beautiful drawings of some fish 
which he had discovered in the Dukhan, was only rescued from oblivion by being published by the 
Zoological Society of London, and other Societies have saved to the public ichthyological papers by 
McClelland, Cantor, and Jerdon. In contrast to this, the Dutch East India Company, alive to the 
importance of this branch of zoology in the East, is at the present time giving to the world the 
splendid and scientific Atlas Ichthyologique, the fruit of the patient and persevering labours carried 
on for many years by Dr. Bleeker of the Dutch army. 
But setting aside the scientific value of Ichthyology, the question arises whether materials fitted 
for manufactures and even food most valuable to the inhabitants of India are not lost, owing to a 
neglect and ignorance of the wealth contained in its waters. It is only of late years, since animal 
oils have become so dear, partially due to a deficieucy of that of the whale, that attention has been 
directed to the immense shoals of Sardines, Sardinella Neohowii, which are found off Malabar and 
Ceylon. It is probably this fish, of which Friar Odoric, who visited Ceylon about a.d. 1320, observed, 
that “ there are fishes in those seas that come swimming towards the said country in such abun¬ 
dance, that for a great distance into the sea nothing can be seen but the backs of fishes, which, 
casting themselves on the shore, do suffer men for the space of three daies to come and take as 
many of them as they please.” (Hakluyt, ii. p. 57.) Nieuhoff recorded (Ed. a.d. 1673) that they 
were abundant, and Dussumier about 1827 observed that they were employed for manuring the 
rice-fields and cocoa-nut trees, but were too fat to salt well. In fact, it may be safely asserted that 
owing to ignorance of their existence and uses, Sardines, ( Charlay , Malayalim), until within the 
last few years, were mostly captured to manure the trees and land with, or for the purpose of 
feeding pigs and poultry, the number consumed by the population being trifling in comparison 
with the amount taken: whilst the Spratella fimbriata, also known as a Sardine, ( Cuttay charlay, 
Mai.), is much preferred for food, as well as being adapted for salting. 
It appears to be but little known that Isinglass not only can be, but is, prepared in large 
quantities in Malabar, from whence it is exported to Bombay under the name of “ Fish sounds,” 
or “ Fish maws,” and eventually finds its way to China. 
Salt fish is also exported in rather considerable quantities—a trade apparently susceptible of 
great increase, and one which must at a future date become most important to the coffee planters 
along the Western Ghauts, for this kind of food is in great request amongst the Coolies employed 
as agricultural labourers, and the carriage which brings down coffee from the interior re-conveys 
a large amount. 
