throws his net. He has also floats of cane, and weights, of small
leathern bags of sand: he beats up against the stream, paddling with his
hands and feet, previous to his drawing the net, which, as it rises from
the water, he lays before him as he sits; and with a sort of mace, which
he carries for the purpose, the fish are stunned by a single blow. His
drag, finished, the fish are taken out, and thrown into the gourds,
which are open at the top, to receive the produce of his labour. These
wells being filled, he steers for the shore, unloads, and again returns
to the sport.--_Denhani's Travels in Africa._

* * * * *


ARABIAN HORSES.


_Sir John Malcolm_, in his Sketches of Persia, gives the following
interesting anecdotes of these noble creatures:--

Hyder, the elchee's master of the chase, was the person who imparted
knowledge to me on all subjects relating to Arabian horses. He would
descant by the hour on the qualities of a colt that was yet untried, but
which, he concluded, must possess all the perfections of its sire and
dam, with whose histories, and that of their progenitors, he was well
acquainted. Hyder had shares in five or six famous brood mares; and he
told me a mare was sometimes divided amongst ten or twelve Arabs, which
accounted for the groups of half-naked fellows whom I saw watching, with
anxiety, the progress made by their managing partner in a bargain for
one of the produce. They often displayed, on these occasions, no small
violence of temper; and I have more than once observed a party leading