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They appeared to have plenty of the necessaries of life, and a great many luxuries. Their fruits are limes, plantains, bananas, and several wild fruits; their vegetables, yams and calalow, a plant, the leaves of which are used in soup as cabbage; and their grain are dhourra and maize. Fish they procure in great quantities from the Quorra and its tributaries, chiefly a sort of cat-fish.
The white fish found in the lakes are much esteemed, and weigh from two or three to seven pounds. There are fine pike also. Sturgeon are caught in Lake Winnipeg and the Lower Saskatchewan of the weight of 160 pounds. Trout grow to a great size, and there are gold-eyes, suckers, and cat-fish. Unattractive as are the names of the two last, the fish themselves are excellent.
I am forever at the heels of the fishermen, promising them double and treble the value of the fish I want, but they all tell me they catch nothing except pike. I have been to Cudrefin for lampreys, but found nothing. I went to Sauge, no eels, no anything but perch and a few little cat-fish. Two mortal Sundays did I spend, rod in hand, trying to catch bream, chubs, etc.
The fish being chosen, the greatest care is necessary in cleaning. If this is properly done, one washing will be sufficient: the custom of allowing fresh fish to lie in water after cleaning, destroys much of their flavor. Fresh-water fish, especially the cat-fish, have often a muddy taste and smell.
That is in spring, when the canal is emptied for repairs, the patching up of leaks, and so forth. Then the fish lie glittering in the shallow pools, as good as caught, and happy children go home with strings of sunfish, "pumpkin-seeds" they call them, cat-fish, and the like picturesque unprofitable spoils, while graver fisher-folk take count of pickerel and bream.
"The coat is perfect," said Isidore; "you have no heart or you would never find fault with such a back." "Would you call me heartless?" "I couldn't call you anything else," replied the valet, bluntly. "Then why have you been with me, cat-fish, ever since I was born?" The Marquis had a stock of names for his servant, none of which he employed unless he felt in a good humour.
As it was, the fall caught me by the fingers with the suck of a cat-fish, and it was only a gigantic wrench that saved me from slipping off the ledge. The jerk brought my head against the rock with a stunning blow, and for some moments I lay dizzy and confused, daring hardly to breathe, and conscious only of a burning and blistering agony in my right hand.
The party camped at the end of about two miles on the right bank of a broad deep creek running in from S.W., when after turning out, some of them went fishing, but only one small cat-fish was caught. 'February' 18. A slight rain fell during last night, but cleared off before morning. The creek was crossed at about a mile from the camp, cattle, horses, and men having to swim.
Any fresh-water fish is good, cooked in this way; cat-fish which have been soaked in salted water, to take away the muddy taste, being especially nice. Cut the fish in small pieces. Boil two sliced onions in a cup of water. Put in the fish, and cook for twenty minutes. Thicken the gravy with a heaping teaspoonful of flour, rubbed to a cream with a teaspoonful of butter.
"It's like taking a hook out of a cat-fish," said the cook, facetiously. "Say, can you open your mouth any wider?" Pinkey made vehement signs that his mouth was stretched to the limit. "It's from ear to ear now, you might say," observed Mr. Budlong. "If you go to monkeying you'll have the top of his head off." "If I could just get my fist up in the roof somehow and then pry down on it."
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