Microplastic pollution in coastal

ecosystem off Mumbai coast, India Udai

Ram Gurjar & K.A Martin Xavier & Satya
Prakash Shukla & Ashok Kumar
Jaiswar & Geetanjali Deshmukhe &
Binaya Bhusan Nayak
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 Chemosphere 288 (2022) 132484

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Chemosphere
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/chemosphere

Microplastic pollution in coastal ecosystem off Mumbai coast, India

Udai Ram Gurjar a, K.A Martin Xavier a, *, Satya Prakash Shukla b, Ashok Kumar Jaiswar a,
Geetanjali Deshmukhe a, Binaya Bhusan Nayak a
a
Fisheries Resource Harvest and Post-Harvest Management Division, ICAR-Central Institute of Fisheries Education (CIFE), Mumbai, 400061, Maharashtra, India
b
Aquatic Environmental Management Department, ICAR-Central Institute of Fisheries Education (CIFE), Mumbai, 400061, Maharashtra, India

H I G H L I G H T S G R A P H I C A L A B S T R A C T

• Microplastics were observed in all the

studied water, sediments and biota
samples.
• MP abundance was relatively higher in
pelagic carnivorous species.
• The smaller size MPs (<250 μm) were
dominantly observed in GI tracts of
marine biota.
• Fish processing interventions to be fol­
lowed prior to consumption for reducing
the health risks.

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Handling Editor: Michael Bank Microplastics (MPs) are anthropogenic pollutants which can adsorb toxic substances from surrounding water and
absorb into the fish body. During the present study, MPs were observed in water, sediment, and gastrointestinal
Keywords: tracts of marine biota samples collected from the coastal waters of Mumbai, India. The mean abundances of MPs
Microplastics recorded in water samples 372 ± 143 items/liter and 9630 ± 2947 items/kg dry weight (DW) in sediment
Water and sediment
samples. The mean abundance of MPs in pelagic fish species varied from 6.74 ± 2.74 to 9.12 ± 3.57 items/
Pollution
individual and in the demersal species the values ranged from 5.62 ± 2.27 to 6.6 ± 2.98 items/individual. Shape-
Marine biota
wise, four type of MPs were observed in the surface waters, sediments and all studied species, predominantly
fibers, followed by fragments, pellets/beads, and films. Seven different colors of MPs (red, blue, black, trans­
lucent, brown, green, and yellow) were observed from studied samples. MPs of size below 250 μm formed the
dominant size in the surface water, sediments, and biota samples except Bombay duck and Malabar sole fish.
Based on Raman spectroscopy analysis, eleven types of plastic polymers identified from all studied samples.
Thus, presence of MPs in studied biota indicates the transfer of MPs through interlinked food chain/web to
higher trophic levels and the occurrence of MPs in the fish gut underlines the necessity of more studies on
processing interventions for reducing the microplastic contamination in fish for human consumption.

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: martinxavier@cife.edu.in (K.AM. Xavier).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chemosphere.2021.132484
Received 11 July 2021; Received in revised form 26 September 2021; Accepted 4 October 2021
Available online 5 October 2021
0045-6535/© 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
U.R. Gurjar et al.
1. Introduction
Globally, plastic production has reached to 359 million metric tons in
2018 (Plastics Europe, 2019). Plastic pollution has become a serious
environmental concern. However, breaking down larger plastic items
into minute fragments (<5 mm-microplastics) has posed severe risk
(Andrady, 2015). Recently, microplastics (MPs) have been identified as
a significant emergent global issue that troubles the life under the sea as
well as human health (Wang et al., 2019). These MPs are the persistent
addition in the aquatic systems and potentially biomagnified in the
living organisms due to non-degradation by microorganisms (Yoshida
et al., 2016). Among all the aquatic faunas, fishes are most affected by
accidental ingestion of MPs. Generally, ingestion of MPs occurs through
direct consumption of MPs at the lower trophic level and reach higher
trophic levels via food chain (Nelms et al., 2018). Therefore, ingestion of
these tiny particles can lead to different abnormalities in the fish body,
such as false hunger satisfaction, physiological stress, reduced enzyme
production, pseudo satiation, reproductive complications, oxidative
stress, and slow growth rate (Espinosa et al., 2017; Jovanović, 2017).
MPs can also adsorb lethal and toxic substances from surrounding
seawater which can enter into the fish body (Reisser et al., 2014). The
ingestion of these particles leads to blockage of the digestive tract which
causing apart from other toxicity in the organisms (Jovanović, 2017).
Keeping in mind the detrimental effect of MPs on aquatic life and
humans, scientific research related to impact of MPs on the ecosystem
has become central issue of research (Shim and Thomposon, 2015). Thus
many reports have been published on the ingestion of MPs by pelagic,
demersal, estuarine, and freshwater biota (Lusher et al., 2013; Zhu et al.,
2019; Gurjar et al., 2021a). Every year, India generates 3.8 million tons
of domestic plastic waste materials (Ministry of Housing and Urban
Affairs, 2019). The Mumbai coast has been undergoing substantial
changes due to rising population, development in coastal areas, and
anthropogenic activities such as industrial and sewage discharge,
municipal solid wastes, tourism, waste from fishing activities (Takar
et al., 2020). In earlier reports, authors have conferred the MPs in beach
sediments golden anchovy and shrimp species along the studied region
(Jayasiri et al., 2013; Gurjar et al., 2021a, 2021b).
The widespread pressures of plastics, especially MPs in natural
habitats and trophic food chains have required regulatory and govern­
ment agencies to gadget targeted activities to mitigate and control
plastic pollution (Galgani et al., 2013). Since commercially exploited
fishes form the main route of MPs transfer from the ecosystem to
humans, an assessment of the rate of microplastic ingestion by the
diverse aquatic biota will help to understand the threats of microplastic
pollution on the ecosystem services and consumers. Along the studied
region small size fishes and shrimps are also consumed in dried form
without removing the gut and hence the availability of MPs in the gut
and their further involvement in the human food is worth reporting.
Further, the knowledge about the concentration of MPs is essential to
assess threat to the marine environment and aquatic organisms. Along
the studied region, limited studied has been performed on the micro­
plastic pollution in coastal beaches and fishes and even still no studies
has been carried out on MPs pollution in coastal sediments and waters.
In view of these facts, the present study was conducted to generate
baseline information on the site-specific microplastic pollution in the
coastal waters, sediments, and commercial fishes and shellfishes, in
order to the intensity of the impacts of microplastic pollution on the
ecosystem and coastal biota of the North eastern Arabian Sea, India.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Study area and sampling procedure
To conduct the present study, coastal areas of Mumbai were selected,
which receive a huge load of plastics waste through industrial and
sewage discharge, fishing activities, aqua tourism, and untreated
2
Chemosphere 288 (2022) 132484
domestic wastewater (Takar et al., 2020). For the study, pelagic species
(Bombay duck, Harpodon nehereus, and White sardine, Escualosa thor­
acata) and demersal species (Belanger croaker, Johnius belangerii;
Malabar sole fish, Cynoglossus macrostomus, and Kadal shrimp, Meta­
penaeus dobsoni) were harvested using a mechanized trawler (Institute’s
fishing research vessel) from the studied areas at depths up to 20 m
during September 2019 to February 2020 (Fig. 1). All collected samples
were kept in an icebox during transportation to the laboratory where
samples were stored in a deep freezer at − 20 ◦ C for further analysis.
Feeding type, habitat, and trophic level for studied species were
collected from the published literature and online data resource Fish­
Base (Froese and Pauly, 2019).
2.2. Gastrointestinal (GI) tracts digestion and filtration
In the laboratory, specimens were thawed; length and weight of in­
dividual specimens were noted and dissected. The gastrointestinal tracts
of all studied samples were carefully dissected out, weighed and stored
in labeled tubes. For the digestion or remove of the organic matter,
samples were kept for 24 h at room temperature after addition of 25–30
ml of 30% hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) into each glass tube, if natural
organic material is visible, add another 20 ml of 30% H2O2 and keep it
back for 12 h to complete the digestion of organic materials (Masura
et al., 2015). After digestion, 4.4 M NaI solution was added into sus­
pension to increase the density of the aqueous solution and kept back for
24 h to allow MPs to float. The clear and supernatant solution was sieved
through nitrocellulose filter paper having a pore size of 0.45 μm under
vacuum filtration and subsequently filtered samples were kept in indi­
vidual Petri dishes with lids and dried at room temperature for further
analysis.
2.3. Water and sediment sampling and analysis
During the study period, monthly water and sediment samples were
randomly collected from three different locations along the studied re­
gion (Fig. 1). Barrows et al. (2017) observed that the water sample
collected surface grab sampling has more MPs than the neuston net tow
sampling because during the sampling procedure the small sized MPs
passed through the mesh of neuston net (333 μm). Therefore, 30 L of
surface water (up to 50 cm depth) was collected using through iron sling
with a stainless steel bucket. The collected water was immediately
sieved through an iron mesh sieve (mesh size 5000 μm) in a steel drum
and covered. At the laboratory, three subsamples of water (each of 1 L)
were taken and filtered through 0.45 μm pore size nitrocellulose filter
paper and filtered materials were kept for digestion of organic matters
using the 30% H2O2. After digestion solutions were filtered through
0.45 μm pore size nitrocellulose filter paper under a vacuum filtration.
Thereafter, filtered samples were subsequently kept in individual Petri
dishes with lids and dried at room temperature for further analysis.
Sediments were sampled to a depths up to 20 m using a sediment
grab sampler from the study area. Further, a subsample of 500 g wet
weight was collected from each location, and mixed. The mixed sample
was dried in the oven at 60 ◦ C. From the dried sediment three sub­
samples each of 10 g were transferred into separate glass bottles and 30
ml of potassium metaphosphate (5.5 g/L) was added it and mixed for 30
min at a speed of 1000 RPM, using a stir bar to break up the clods
(Masura et al., 2015). Latter, the sediment solution was sieved through
5 mm sized mesh sieves and washed with filtered distilled water. In the
sieved materials, 4.4 M NaI solution was added for the density separa­
tion of MPs, treated with hydrogen peroxide, and filtered as described
previously.
2.4. Identification of microplastics
The materials retained on the filter papers were observed using an
Olympus stereo zoom microscope (SZX16 Model, India). The visual
U.R. Gurjar et al.
Fig. 1. Map showing the sampling locations in north eastern Arabian Sea.
assessment of MPs was made according to the shape, colour, and size of
the material, and the images were captured (Li et al., 2015; Gurjar et al.,
2021b). Raman spectroscopy was used to efficiently evaluate the MPs
polymer (Gurjar et al., 2021b; Dong et al., 2020a). Further, the sus­
pected particulates, on the filter paper were analyzed using laser Raman
spectroscopy to confirm the functional groups of plastic polymer.
2.5. Contamination control
During the experimental field sampling, glass bottles containing
filtered distilled water were kept open as blank field samples at each
sampling location. Altogether, eighteen blank field samples were used to
quantify the potential contamination during the field sampling proced­
ure. Two MP items were recorded from the eighteen field blank samples,
which was negligible as compared to the total number of MP items
recorded in the present study. A total of 36 laboratory blanks without
seawater, sediment, and gastrointestinal tract samples were used to
know the procedural contamination. To minimize the chance of MPs
contamination in the laboratory, all glass wares were rinsed twice with
ultrapure water, wore nitrile gloves and personnel cotton lab coat and
the samples were covered with aluminum foil to prevent air-borne
contamination during the entire process. The extraction of MPs from
all samples was performed under a fume hood and remained covered
with aluminum foil to prevent air-borne contamination during the lab­
oratory procedure. All the used chemicals and mixtures were filtered
through a filter paper having a pore size of 0.45 μm (Gurjar et al.,
2021a).
2.6. Statistical analysis
The obtained data were analyzed using the EXCEL (2013 version,
Microsoft) and SPSS software (version 20.0). One-way ANOVA was
performed to know the difference in size-wise microplastic abundance
between the studied marine species. Pearson correlation was used to
check the associations between microplastic abundance and the total
length, total weight, GI tract weight of studied samples.
3
Chemosphere 288 (2022) 132484
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Abundance of microplastics in water and sediments
MPs were observed in all the studied water and sediments samples
collected from Mumbai coast, where the abundances of MPs ranged from
165 to 547 items/liter in water and 4900–14,500 items/kg dry weight
(DW) in sediments. The MP items observed in sediments during the
present research, are in accordance with earlier findings (Bauerlein
et al., 2020; Leslie et al., 2017). In Dutch marine sediments, MPs ranged
from 479 to 13,931 items/kg DW (Bauerlein et al., 2020); 100 to 3600
particles/kg dry sediment were recorded from the Dutch North Sea coast
(Leslie et al., 2017). The Amsterdam urban canal water and sediment
contained 48–187 per liter and 68–10,500 particles/kg DW, respectively
(Leslie et al., 2017). The raw sewage influents collected from municipal
wastewater treatment plants in the Netherlands contained microplastic
concentrations of 68–910 particles/liter (Leslie et al., 2017). Dong et al.
(2020b) also recorded the higher abundance of MPs 7707 items/kg in
sediment collected from an urban lake in Wuhan city. MPs in the size
fraction between 63 and 5000 μm have been recorded in the sediment of
rivers Rhine and Main in ranged from 228 to 3763 and 786–1368
items/kg DW, respectively (Klein et al., 2015). The very high numbers of
MP with 75,000 particles/kg were recorded in the sediment of river
Mersey/Irwell (Hurley et al., 2018). Kim et al. (2015) studied MPs dis­
tribution in surface water of Soya Island, South Korea, and found, on
average, 46,334 ± 71,291 items/m2. The abundances of MPs were
recorded in water (334–1058 items/m3) and sediments (508–3987
items/kg DW) with the dominance of fiber in Fengshan river, Taiwan
(Tien et al., 2020). All these studies show that throughout the world,
sediments and waters of the sea, rivers, and lakes are contaminated with
microplastic pollution. Similarly, present study revealed that studied
region also polluted with MPs due to its huge population and various
anthropogenic activities such as abrasion of tires, fishing activities, in­
dustrial and sewage discharge into the coastal waters.
U.R. Gurjar et al. Chemosphere 288 (2022) 132484

3.2. Characteristics of microplastics in water and sediments recorded in the coastal water and sediments of Goa (Saha et al., 2021)
and southwest coast of India (Robin et al., 2020). The black MPs mainly
In the present study, smaller MPs less than 100 μm and 250 μm was might have come into the environment due to abrasion of tires on the
comparatively higher appeared in the coastal water than sediments, road surfaces as regular wear and tear (Wik and Dave, 2009). Colored
while MPs with size groups of greater than 250 μm was higher in coastal microplastic particles are commonly used in packaging, clothing, and
sediments than water (Fig. 2). Small sized MPs generated from the several other applications (Wang et al., 2017).
degradation of large plastic debris or direct discharge of primary MPs
after using related products (Cole et al., 2011; Wang et al., 2017; Lin
3.3. Abundance of microplastics in biota
et al., 2018). As plastic marine debris on coastal beaches and floating in
coastal water is exposed to solar UV radiation, it undergoes extensive
During the present study, 1725 MP particles were collected from the
weathering and progressively degrades it into smaller particles (Cooper
gastrointestinal tracts of 250 specimens of pelagic (Bombay duck, Har­
and Corcoran, 2010; Yakimets et al., 2004). Frei et al. (2019) observed a
podon nehereus and White sardine, Escualosa thoracata) and demersal
higher abundance of MPs with decreasing the particle size.
species (Belanger croaker, Johnius belangerii; Malabar sole fish, Cyn­
During the present study, four different morpho-types of MPs such as
oglossus macrostomu, and kadal shrimp, Metapenaeus dobsoni) and MPs
fibers, fragments, pellets/beads, and films were recorded from the sur­
were found in all the studied samples (Table 1). The results of the pre­
face water and sediment samples (Fig. 3). Fibres were most dominant in
sent study may not be directly comparable to other studies from
the coastal water and sediments of studied region, followed by frag­
different parts of the world due to methodological variations; however,
ments, pellet/beads and films (Fig. 4). Globally, fiber-shaped MPs
similar results on occurrence of MPs in all fishes was reported from the
represent the highest abundance of plastic in marine environments
Adriatic Sea (Anastasopoulou et al., 2018), R’ıo de la Plata estuary
(Walkinshaw et al., 2020). The more availability and distribution of
(Pazos et al., 2017) and Shanghai market (Jabeen et al., 2017).
fiber-shaped MPs shown a close association to the various anthropogenic
Comparatively lower ingestion was observed in fishes from the different
activities such as waste generated during washing of clothes, rope ma­
part of the globe such as Adriatic sea (Pellini et al., 2018), Tokyo Bay
terial used in the fisheries sector and textile fibres from domestic
(Tanaka and Takada, 2016); Mediterranean Sea (Nadal et al., 2016;
wastewater discharge, and other activities by the local human in the
Güven et al., 2017; Fossi et al., 2018; Giani et al., 2019), Kerala (Daniel
studied region (Takar et al., 2020; White et al., 2018; Andrady, 2011).
et al., 2020), North Pacific Central Gyre (Boerger et al., 2010), south­
The fragments might result from the degradation of larger plastic
west coast of India (Robin et al., 2020), south east Bay of Bengal (Kar­
products due to abrasion and weathering (Karthik et al., 2018). In
uppasamy et al., 2020), south east coast of India (James et al., 2020). In
contrast, film originates from mismanaged single-use plastic packaging
the present study, MPs abundance was found to be positively correlated
materials that are easily carried by winds and riverine discharge (Robin
(p < 0.01) with the total length, total weight and GI tract weight of
et al., 2020). On the other hand, pellets/beads resulted from the use of
individuals (SI Table 1), which suggests that the larger size of in­
microbeads in cosmetic and personal care products and accidental or
dividuals contained the more MPs than smaller ones (Gurjar et al.,
intentional spillage and disposal during their manufacture (White et al.,
2021b).
2018; Mintenig et al., 2017).
MPs were found in both pelagic and demersal species, but the MP
In the present study, seven different MPs colors (red, blue, black,
abundance was relatively higher in pelagic species, possibly due to
translucent, brown, green and yellow) were recorded with predominant
insignificant weight of these particles allowing them to restrict to
black color in coastal water and sediment samples (Fig. 5). The color of
pelagic realm and feeding behaviors of fishes. Thus, among the fishes
MPs is imperative in source detection (Veerasingam et al., 2016;
studied, an average higher abundance of MPs (9.12 ± 3.57 items/
Koongolla et al., 2018) and is an important ingestion cue for few or­
specimen) was recorded in Harpadon nehereus, a pelagic species and
ganisms that visually detect food (Maharana et al., 2020). Similar to the
lower in Cynoglossus macrostomus (5.62 ± 2.27 items/individual), a
present study, the proportion of black color MPs were abundantly
benthic species. As compared to benthic species, pelagic fishes required

Fig. 2. Size wise MPs observed in the water and sediment samples.

4
U.R. Gurjar et al. Chemosphere 288 (2022) 132484

Fig. 3. Different types and color of MPs recorded from studied samples. (a) Fibre with black color (b) Beads/pelllet with red color (c) Fragment of green color (d)
Fibre with brown color (e) Fragment with yellow color (f) Film with blue color.

more energy to swim; therefore, to get more food they mistakenly feed Sea (Anastasopoulou et al., 2018). Hossain et al. (2019) also recorded
upon MPs that look similar to their prey items. James et al. (2020) also 8.72 ± 1.54 and 5.80 ± 1.41 particles/individuals in the gut of Harpadon
reported higher abundance of MPs in pelagic species than demersal nehereus and Harpadon translucens, respectively from the Bay of Bengal.
species from the south east coast of India. In the current study, the
average number of MPs varied from 6.74 ± 2.74 to 9.12 ± 3.57 item­
3.4. Microplastics in gastrointestinal tracts
s/individuals in pelagic species and 5.62 ± 2.27 to 6.6 ± 2.98 item­
s/individuals in demersal species, which is relatively greater than most
3.4.1. Size of microplastics
of the earlier investigations conducted from different parts of the globe
In the present study, MP items were classified into four different size
(Nadal et al., 2016; Fossi et al., 2018; Herrera et al., 2019; James et al.,
categories, i.e., <100 μm, 101–250 μm, 251–500 μm, 501–1000 μm, and
2020). Further, the marine fishes inhabiting the shallow coastal waters
>1000 μm. The size-wise percentages of MPs in all studied species are
would have a higher chance of MPs ingestion than those living within
presented as follows (Fig. 6). The size wise number of MPs was found
the deep-sea environment because anthropogenic activities along shore
significantly different within the studied species and the number of MPs
areas lead to higher MPs concentrations in shallow areas (Pozo et al.,
with a size of <100 μm was highest in white sardine and shrimp fol­
2019). While compared with the present investigation, higher MPs
lowed by Belanger croaker, Bombay duck, and Malabar sole fish
abundance were recorded in Chelon auratus (9.5 items/fish) of the
(Table 2). In Cynoglossus macrostomus, size-wise (<100 μm) number of
Adriatic Sea and Solea solea (7.3 particles/fish) from the Mediterranean
MPs was observed significantly lower as compared to all other species,

5
U.R. Gurjar et al. Chemosphere 288 (2022) 132484

Fig. 4. Morpho type composition of MPs recorded in the sediment and water samples.

Fig. 5. Color wise composition of MPs recorded in the water and sediments. (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure legend, the reader is referred
to the Web version of this article.)

which might be due to differences in their preferred habitat and feeding
types. A higher number of small size MPs (<100 μm) recorded in white
sardine and shrimp might be due to their smaller body size, limited
choice of food items, and microplastic particle size similar to their prey
size (Hossain et al., 2019; Cole et al., 2013). The number of MPs with the
size of 251–500, 501–1000 and > 1000 μm were significantly (P < 0.05)
higher in Bombay duck, which may be due to their larger size of mouth,
body, and feeding behavior, which agreed with earlier findings of
Hossain et al. (2019). The number of MPs with the size of 501–1000 μm
did not show a significant (P > 0.05) difference between white sardine,
croaker, and sole fish.
3.4.2. Shape of microplastics
Concerning the characteristics, four different morphotypes of the
MPs were observed in the studied samples. The most common shape of
MPs was categorized as fiber, followed by fragments, pellet/beads, and
film (Fig. 3). In Cynoglossus macrostomus, fragments were dominantly
recorded while fiber types were dominant in all other species compared
to other MPs shapes (Fig. 7). The results of the present study align with
the result of earlier reports from the Mediterranean sea (Nadal et al.,
2016) and Bohai Sea (Dai et al., 2018), where different species of
shrimps and fishes dominantly ingested fibers (Gurjar et al., 2021b;
Hossain et al., 2020; Jabeen et al., 2017; Sathish et al., 2020). Globally,
fiber-shaped MPs are present in the highest abundance in the marine

6
U.R. Gurjar et al. Chemosphere 288 (2022) 132484

Table 1
Feeding characteristics, trophic level and occurrence of microplastics in marine biota and environments.
Sample details Habitat Trophic level Feeding Total length range Total weight range MP number/fish (Mean Occurrence
value type (mm) (g) ± SD) (%)

White sardine (Escualosa. Pelagic 3.16 ± 0.08 Planktivore 73–108 5.8–13.54 6.74 ± 2.74 100
thoracata)
Bombay duck (Harpodon Pelagic 4.10 ± 0.74 Carnivore 135–270 9.78–101 9.12 ± 3.57 100
nehereus)
Belanger croaker (Johnius Demersal 3.27 ± 0.32 Carnivore 72–195 4.5–92.81 6.42 ± 2.65 100
belangerii)
Kadal shrimp (Metapenaeus Demersal 3.50 ± 0.50 Omnivore 81–171 5.2–53.30 6.60 ± 2.98 100
dobsoni)
Malabar sole (Cynoglossus Demersal 3.30 ± 0.32 Omnivore 100–170 5.03–23.48 5.62 ± 2.27 100
macrostomus)
Water (MPs items/liter) – – – – – 372 ± 143 100
Sediment (MPs items/kg DW) – – – – – 9630 ± 2947 100

Fig. 6. Size wise ingestion of MPs recorded in the GI tracts of studied species.

Table 2
Size-wise variation in abundance of microplastics in different marine biota.
Size of MPs Numbers of MPs

Escualosa thoracata Johnius belangerii Harpodon nehereus Metapenaeus dobsoni Cynoglossus macrostomus

<100 μm 1.84 ± 0.13d 0.90 ± 0.12b 0.72 ± 0.10ab 1.30 ± 0.12c 0.42 ± 0.08a
<100–250 μm 1.54 ± 0.12b 1.82 ± 0.11b 1.66 ± 0.12b 2.54 ± 0.18c 0.84 ± 0.09a
251–500 μm 1.42 ± 0.13a 1.48 ± 0.09a 3.40 ± 0.23c 1.70 ± 0.13ab 1.98 ± 0.14b
501–1000 μm 1.14 ± 0.13b 1.18 ± 0.11b 1.60 ± 0.11c 0.72 ± 0.09a 1.02 ± 0.11ab
>1000 μm 0.80 ± 0.12b 1.04 ± 0.13bc 1.74 ± 0.15d 0.34 ± 0.07a 1.36 ± 0.13c

Values are expressed as mean ± SE; n = 50 each; Mean value in the same row with different superscripts are significantly different (P < 0.05).

environments (Walkinshaw et al., 2020). The more availability and
distribution of fiber-shaped MPs shown a close association to the various
anthropogenic activities such as fisheries activity, packaging of food
products, aqua tourism, domestic wastewater discharge, use of
microbeads in personal care products, waste generated during washing
of clothes and other activities in the studied region (Browne et al., 2011;
Takar et al., 2020).
3.4.3. Color of microplastics
In the current study, seven colors of MPs (red, blue, black, trans­
lucent, brown, green and yellow) were recorded from the studied
samples. The black color MPs were predominantly recorded in shrimp
(33.03%), Bombay duck (30.48%), and Malabar sole fish (29.54%),
while blue color was dominant in white sardine and Belanger croakers.
The green and yellow colors of MPs were observed only in the GI tracts
of Malabar sole fish, Belanger croaker and Bombay duck (Fig. 8).
Daniel et al. (2020) recorded six different colors (red, blue, green,
transparent, white, black) of MPs from inedible tissue (gills and viscera)
of pelagic fishes. Similar to findings of the present study, different colors
of MPs were recorded in different pelagic and demersal fishes from other
parts of the globe (Boerger et al., 2010; Daniel et al., 2020; Lusher et al.,
2013; Ory et al., 2017). Hossain et al. (2020) recorded five colors of MPs

7
U.R. Gurjar et al. Chemosphere 288 (2022) 132484

Fig. 7. Morpho type composition of MPs recorded in the GI tracts of studied species.

Fig. 8. Colour wise composition of MPs recorded in the GI tracts of studied species. (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure legend, the reader is
referred to the Web version of this article.)

(black, white, green, blue and red) in the gut of P. monodon dominant
with black color (48%). Plastic particles, particularly
yellow/pale-yellow colored pellets with irregular outer surfaces, may
imitate a certain degree of photo-oxidative weathering (Maharana et al.,
2020) and the clear and translucent colors of MPs are formed presum­
ably due to weathering and fading of plastic substances in the envi­
ronment (Herrera et al., 2019). Due to filter-feeding habits, fishes move
near to the surface of the water, where they ingest free-floating MPs
mistakenly, as they are visually similar to their prey items (Renzi et al.,
2018). The black and blue colors were selected through the feeding
strategies of European anchovy because they feed on the dark prey items
(Renzi et al., 2018). The blue colour is extensively used for
manufacturing fishing rope and nets to catch fishes (Sathish et al.,
2020). The color of plastic items affects their bioavailability because
they look similar to their prey items such as species of blue copepod (Ory
et al., 2017).
3.5. Plastic polymer in water, sediment and marine biota
The suspected microplastic particles were randomly selected and
analyzed using the Laser Raman Spectroscopy to validate polymer
functional groups. A total of eleven different plastic polymers was
identified from the studied samples of water, sediment, and biota
(Fig. 9). Among the biota samples, nine plastic polymers such as poly­
propylene, polyethylene, polystyrene, polyamide, nylon, polycarbonate,
polymethyl methacrylate, polyester, polyethylene terephthalate were

8
U.R. Gurjar et al.
Fig. 9. Raman spectroscopy results of microplastics obtained from the studied
(a) water, (b) sediment and (c) biota samples. Polypropylene (a, c) Polyethylene
(a, b, c) Polyvinyl chloride (b) Polystyrene (a, b, c) Polyethylene terephthalate
(b, c) Nylon 6 (a, b, c) Polycarbonate (a, b, c) Polyacrylamide (a, b) Polyester (a,
b, c) Poly methyl methacrylate (b, c) Polyamide (a, b, c).
recorded from GI tracts of the studied samples. Similar to the results of
the current study, ten plastic polymers were observed from the gut
contents of commercial fishes caught from of the Bohai sea (Wang et al.,
2021).
9
Chemosphere 288 (2022) 132484
The polymer analysis of water samples revealed the eight types of
MPs polymers such as polypropylene, polyethylene, polystyrene, poly­
amide, polyester, nylon, polycarbonate, polymethyl methacrylate.
However, from sediments samples, ten MPs polymers were recorded
except polypropylene. Similar to the present results, eleven types of
plastic polymer (polyethylene, polypropylene, α-cellulose, polyethylene
terephthalate, cellulose acetate, polyamide, polybutene, polymethyl
methacrylate, cellophane, polyurethane, and ethylene/ethyl acrylate)
were reported in water and sediment samples collected from the Yangtze
Estuary, China (Li et al., 2020). In the present study, MPs denser than
water such as polyamide, polyester, nylon, polycarbonate, polymethyl
methacrylate were also recorded from water samples. A possible reason
is that high-density particles can again enter the water column by
resuspension of bottom soils (Lambert and Wagner, 2018). Influenced by
offshore tides and nearshore circulation, the sediment resuspension in
tidal estuaries contributes to exchanging materials between water and
sediment phases (Shi et al., 1996). Thus, in this study, low-density
microplastic (polyethylene) was also observed in the sediment sam­
ples, which could be due to change in densities with biofouling and
weathering in the aquatic environment (Long et al., 2015).
3.6. Ecological significance of MPs
The white sardine feed on small planktonic organisms such as co­
pepods, cladocerans, fish larvae, mysids, diatoms, polychaete larvae,
which are the common prey items for various fish and shellfish species
(Froese and Pauly, 2019; Gurjar et al., 2017). Kadal shrimp feeds on
(diatoms, detritus, small crustaceans and polychaetes); Belanger croaker
feeds upon (shrimp and fishes); sole fish feeds on (diatoms, algae,
bivalve remains, gastropod remains, polychaetes, fish eggs, mysids,
copepods, and other crustacean) (Froese and Pauly, 2019) and Bombay
duck feeds on shrimps, small size fishes, sciaenids, and juveniles of fish
and shellfishes (Froese and Pauly, 2019; Balli et al., 2006). In the present
study, based on feeding behaviors, MPs were observed in planktivorous
(white sardine), carnivorous (Bombay duck and Belanger croaker), and
omnivorous species (kadal shrimp and Malabar sole fish). Thus, MPs in
water, sediment, fishes (pelagic and demersal) and different feeding
types of fishes showed a chance of transfer of MPs to higher trophic
levels in the aquatic ecosystems.
Copepods, common food items for many aquatic organisms are re­
ported to ingest MPs (Botterell et al., 2019). Accidental ingestion and
consuming the microplastic contaminated prey items were observed in
marine biota (Renzi et al., 2018; Gurjar et al., 2021a), probably leading
to transfer and accumulation at different trophic levels, a phenomenon
called trophic transfer (Welden et al., 2018). In the present study, it has
been observed that the carnivore species, Bombay duck have more MPs
than other carnivores (J. belangarii), plankton feeder (E. thoracata), and
omnivores species (C. macrostomus and M. dobsoni), while plankton
feeder species E. thoracata have more MPs than carnivores (J. belangarii),
and omnivores species (C. macrostomus and M. dobsoni). The findings of
the present study are similar to the results obtained for six fish species
exhibiting three different types of feeding habits from the coastal waters
of the southeast coast of India (Sathish et al., 2020) and eleven fish
species with four different kinds of feeding behaviors observed from the
South America waters (Pazos et al., 2017).
Trophic transfer of microplastic to upper the trophic level of the food
chain has been observed in several aquatic organisms (Nelms et al.,
2018). The availability of MPs in the plankton feeder fish has a chance of
MPs transfer to the higher trophic predators (Boerger et al., 2010). Thus,
Romeo et al. (2015) noted biomagnifications in the bluefin tuna, alba­
core, and swordfish along the Mediterranean Sea. The trophic transfer of
MPs has also been evidenced from Atlantic mackerels, Scomber scombrus
to gray seals, Halichoerus grypus (Nelms et al., 2018). The present study
observed that studied biota are inter-linked in the food web, so there are
increased chances of MPs transfer from one trophic level to another.
Generally, fish are consumed in fresh condition, while Bombay duck,
U.R. Gurjar et al.
white sardine, croakers, and shrimps are also consumed in dried form
(Bharda et al., 2017). Along with the studied region, Bombay duck,
white sardine, croakers, and shrimps are used for drying without
removing the digestive tract and therefore, the chance of trophic transfer
of MPs is more.
4. Conclusion
The present study assessed the microplastic concentration in the
water, sediment and marine organisms, revealed that MPs were found in
both pelagic and demersal species, but the MP abundance was relatively
higher in pelagic species. This illustrates that species inhabiting the
shallow coastal waters are more prone to ingestion of MPs because
anthropogenic activities along shore areas leading to higher MPs con­
centrations in coastal areas. The smaller size of MPs (<250 μm) was
dominantly observed in guts of studied species, suggested that need of
consumption of deveined and degutted shrimp and fish species. Even
though studies on trophic transfer of MPs have been accomplished but
the reports are limited; therefore especially site specific studies will
facilitate in a better understanding that will form baseline information
for an effective management of microplastic pollution in coastal
habitats.
CRediT author statement
Udai Ram Gurjar: Data investigation, Writing the initial draft prep­
aration K.A. Martin Xavier: Conceptualization Supervision- Reviewing
and Editing Satya Prakash Shukla: Advisor in sampling Geetanjali
Deshmukhe: supervision of microscopic analysis Ashok Kumar Jaiswar:
Gut analysis and reviewing Binaya Bhusan Nayak: Project administra­
tion supervision I also declare that all authors and tacitly or explicitly by
the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if
accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English
or in any other language, including electronically without the written
consent of the copyright-holder.
Declaration of competing interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgments
The authors are gratified to the Director of ICAR-Central Institute of
Fisheries Education, Mumbai for providing the necessary facilities and
support to the conduct the research work. The authors are also appre­
ciative the support and help received by the crew members of CIFE
vessel Narmada during the entire sampling period.
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://doi.
org/10.1016/j.chemosphere.2021.132484.
Funding
This research did not receive any specific grant from funding
agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
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Another random document with
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mystery. She felt that it would be long before she could understand
the least of Cecil, particularly if he was anything like Lord
Arrowmount. It is true that he had often written at great length, and
by no means ignored the sacred subject of himself; but there was
always a magnificent reach about Cecil, and a corresponding lack of
ingenuousness.
She wondered if she had given him the same suggestion of a
complex mind and nature, and one day re-read his letters. The first
fifteen or twenty contained references to the episodes of their brief
companionship. Later, these episodes seemed quite forgotten. And
he not only demanded no return of confidences, he evinced no
curiosity. In all his letters there was not a reference to her inner life.
Occasionally he asked what she was reading, and if she were happy
in her new home; that was all.
“How is one to prepare oneself for such a man as that?” thought Lee.
“What does he want? An ear—nothing more? He seems different
enough from American men. They seem either to understand me, or
to suggest that it doesn’t matter whether they do or not; I am perfect
all the same. But Cecil Maundrell!” She kicked out her little foot
rather viciously. After all, why should she adapt herself to anybody?
She was an individuality, more of one every month of her life, and
extremely interesting to herself and other people. Englishwomen,
she had been told, were very much of a pattern—the result of
centuries of breeding in uninterrupted conditions. It was the very
reverse that made up nine-tenths of the fascination of the American
woman. When she married Cecil Maundrell—she had tossed “if” out
of her vocabulary—they might take a year or two to adjust
themselves to each other; but they both had brains enough to
succeed in the end; and he could not fail to be charmed with a wife
cut out of her own piece of cloth, and specially designed for himself.
 CHAPTER XXIII
LEE spent the following winter in New York and Washington, with
friends of Mrs. Montgomery, who met and made much of her Del
Monte. Her social success in both places was very great, and she
carried off all the honours that an ambitious young beauty could
desire. She met many men-of-the-world. The species rather alarmed
her at first, but, after she had posed herself, they amused her more;
in their way, they were as ingenuous as the callow youth of San
Francisco. She returned to California wiser than when she had left it,
and a trifle more subtle, but with an undiminished vitality of spirit, and
with the romantic imp in the depths of her brain as active as ever. It
had been Mrs. Montgomery’s intention to join Lee in the spring, take
her to visit Tiny, then to the great show places of Europe—invented
by a benign Providence for the American tourist; but an attack of
rheumatism defeated the project, and Lee hastened home to her.
She was not sorry to return. The East quickly palls on the Californian
of temperament and imagination, and before the winter was over Lee
had begun to long for the mysterious Latin charm of her own country,
and for its unvarying suggestion of unlimited space. Moreover, she
feared to miss Cecil Maundrell if she went abroad at this time; his
movements seemed very erratic, and his letters were brief and
unexplanatory. He might change his plans, and come to California at
any moment. Above all, she wanted to meet him on her own ground,
in the country which had gone largely into the making of her; not in
Tiny’s drawing-room, surrounded by a conventional house-party.
Sometimes she wondered at the persistence of her desire for Cecil
Maundrell, considering how little it had to feed upon, and preferred to
conclude that they were held together by some mysterious bond
compounded in the laboratory of Nature, whose practical
manifestation only awaited the pleasure of Time. It is true that there
were periods when she was rebellious and angry, and during one of
Cecil’s long silences—he had not written for four months—she came
very close to marrying Randolph. He was ever at her elbow, with a
persistence generally quiet, occasionally impassioned. He made
himself useful to her in a thousand ways, and studied her tastes;
reading her favourite books, and keeping up with her fads. He was
clever and companionable, and would, indubitably, make a good
husband. He did not interest her; she knew him too well, and her
power over him was too sure, but her second winter in San
Francisco had bored her; she was out of tune with the world for the
moment, and very human; she was in the mood, failing the best, to
hang her ideals upon the man who pleased her most, and to love
him by sheer exercise of imagination; a mood that has ruined the life
of more women than one.
She was balancing the pros and cons more seriously than she was
aware, when she received a letter from Cecil Maundrell.
It was early spring. The family had moved down to Menlo sooner
than usual on account of Mrs. Montgomery’s health, which was still
delicate; and Lee was starting for a ride to the hills, when the stable-
boy returned from the village with the morning mail. She sent her
other letters into the house, unopened, and rode off rapidly with
Cecil’s. It was of unusual thickness; she had not received one so
heavy since the Sturm und Drang of his Oxford days.
When she was half-way down the lane that led to the hills she read
his letter. Its length was its one point of resemblance to his note-
books of Oxford. Several of its pages were filled with half-tender,
half-humorous reminiscences of “the happiest and most piquant
weeks of his life”; the rest to the enthusiasm with which he was filled
at the prospect of seeing her again, mingled with unsubtle masculine
suggestions that he would take a friendly pleasure in learning that
she had not committed her future to some man who was not half
good enough for her. The letter was dated New York, where he had
been visiting an American college friend for two weeks. He expected
to start immediately for the ranch of some English friends in the “Far
West,” and to reach California in five or six weeks. Would she write
him at once to the enclosed address, and tell him news of herself?
Lee’s horse was walking slowly up the lane between hedges of wild
roses and fragrant chaparral. She glanced about vaguely, hardly
recognising the familiar beautiful scene: the green foothills crouched
close against the great mountains that were dark and still with their
majestic redwoods crowding like brush and piercing the sky on the
long irregular crest; the dazzling blue sky, the soft blue haze on the
mountains, the glory of colour in the fields, and on the lower slopes
of the hills; for the poppies and baby-eyes, lupins, and California
lilies, were swarming over the land.
What did the letter mean? Had Cecil Maundrell written it in a dream,
in which she, perchance, had visited him? She read it again. It was
remarkably wide-awake. And it was almost a love-letter.
She glanced about more appreciatively. The soft rich mysterious
beauty of the day and of California symphonised with the flush on
her cheeks, the rapt languor of her eyes, the quickening within her.
She spent the greater part of the day in the hills, buying a glass of
milk and some bread at a farmhouse. When she reached the
redwoods on the long slopes, she tethered her horse, and wandered
far into the forest. The very mystery of life brooded in those dim cool
aisles, whose silence was undisturbed by the low roar of spring
waters, whose feathery green undergrowth was barely flecked by the
brilliant sun above the dense arbours high on the grey columns of
the forest.
She lay on the edge of the bluff above the creek and watched the
salmon moving in lazy and unperturbed possession of their sparkling
waters, the darting trout, the wilderness of ferns and lilac and lily
down on the water’s edge. A deer climbed down the opposite bank
and drank; owls cried to each other in the night of the forest; two
hundred feet above her head the squirrels exchanged drowsy
remarks; in the warm green twilight of the afternoon the very birds
went to sleep.
It was not the first time that Lee had dreamed of Cecil Maundrell in
this forest; she doubted if he would seem as naturally encompassed
by the beech woods and fells, the ruins and traditions of his English
home. Certainly this was as old, and as surely it was a part of her.
They both had unnumbered generations behind them: his were thick
with men and events; hers with redwoods, whose aisles were
unpeopled, in whose impenetrable depths tradition itself was lost.
She returned home late in the afternoon. Randolph, who had just
come from town, was standing on the steps, and ran forward to lift
her down.
“My mother was beginning to worry,” he said; “you ought to take a
boy with you. If you don’t want a servant, I will stay down and
accompany you.”
Lee flicked him lightly with her whip. “Then I wouldn’t go,” she said. “I
love to ride about for hours by myself. Fancy if one could never get
away from men.”
She spoke airily, but Randolph looked hard at her.
“What has happened?” he demanded. “There is something quite
unusual about you.”
Lee blushed, but Cecil’s letter was safe in her bosom.
“Don’t ask impertinent questions, and see that you don’t talk me to
death to-night; I’m tired,” and she ran upstairs.
Her other mail lay on her dressing-table. She opened a letter from
Coralie, who was visiting friends in New York.
“Well,” it began abruptly, “I have met your Cecil. It was last
night, at a dinner-party at the Forbes’. He is tall, you will
be pleased to learn, and I fancy he might look quite
athletic and ‘masterful’ (your style) in evening clothes that
fitted him. But I believe he has been sporting round the
world with a couple of portmanteaux, and avoiding polite
society. He wore a suit belonging to Schemmerhorn Smith,
whom he is visiting, and it was just two sizes too small. He
didn’t seem in the least embarrassed about it, and his
manners are quite simple and natural. He doesn’t talk very
much, but is a good deal easier to get on with than that
awful Lord Arrowmount. At first I was frightfully afraid of
him—of course, being the lord of the party, he took in Mrs.
Forbes, but I sat on the other side of him, and Mrs. Forbes
had a scientific thing on her other side, and had to give
him most of her attention. Well, where was I? Scared to
death in the memory of those letters—of course I didn’t
breathe that I’d read them—but he’s not in the least like
them—at all events not at dinner-parties. He was very
much interested when I told him I was your intimate friend,
although not so much as later—but wait a minute. You
may be sure I said everything under Heaven in your
praise, but, curiously, I never mentioned your beauty,
although I dilated upon your success, and all the scalps
you wore at your belt, and that you had a room whose
walls were simply covered with german favours. He
warmed to the theme as time went on, and said you had
always been his greatest chum, and that he was going to
California for two things only—to kill a grizzly and see you.
He put the grizzly first, but never mind—he’s English. Now
comes the point. After dinner, as soon as the men came
in, he made for me—I didn’t tell you that I’m sure he’s shy
—and I took him straight to your photograph, which is
enthroned on a table all by itself.
“‘There she is,’ I said.
“He took it up. ‘Who?’ he asked, staring at it with all his
eyes—they are nice honest hazel eyes, by the way, that
often laugh, although I’ll bet he has a temper.
“‘Who?—Why, Lee, of course!’
“He stared harder at the picture—it is the low-necked one
you had taken here, in black gauze and coloured—then he
turned and stared at me. ‘Lee?’ he said. ‘This is Lee?’ and
if he were not burnt a beautiful mahogany, I do believe he
would have turned pale. He’s got a mouth on him, my
dear, that means things, and it trembled.
“‘She’s grown up very pretty,’ he said in a moment, as
carelessly as he could manage. ‘I never suspected that
she would—that she had. Of course some of your
enterprising Americans have snatched her up. I haven’t
heard from her for a long time. Is she engaged?’
 “‘Not that I know of,’ I said, ‘although she has three or four
admirers so persistent, you never know what you may
hear any minute.’ I thought a little worry wouldn’t hurt him;
he looks altogether too satisfied, as if he had been born to
plums, and never had anything else. All he said was ‘Ah!’
He put the picture back, and we went off to the music-
room, but he managed to pass that table twice before the
evening was over—and I must say, I’ve seen American
men manage things more diplomatically. But there’s
something rather magnificent about him, all the same.
He’s not very entertaining—Randolph would fairly
scintillate beside him—but his air of repose and
remoteness from the hustling every-day world are really
fine. If he had worn a potato sack instead of his almost
equally grotesque get-up, he would have looked as
unmistakably what he is. I hunted industriously for all his
good points to please you, but give me an American every
time. I never was intended for a miner, and you have to go
into an Englishman’s brain with a pick and shovel. Your
Cecil suggests that he’s got a solid mine of real intellect,
developed with all the modern improvements, inside his
skull; but what’s the good, when you can’t hear the
nuggets rattle? He wouldn’t even tell me his adventures—
shut up like a clam, and said they were just like any other
fellow’s; and Schemmerhorn Smith told me that same
evening that the men Lord Maundrell was with said he
was one of the crack sportsmen of the day. Do you
remember when Tom killed that panther that attacked him
in the redwoods? We had it for breakfast, lunch, and
dinner for a month. Of course a happy medium’s the thing;
but for my part, I don’t like too much modesty. I’m
suspicious of it....”
So it was her beauty that had shifted the strata in Lord Maundrell’s
solid mine of intellect? It must have caused something of a shock to
have resulted in a letter which almost committed him. It was both a
jar and a relief to discover that he was much like other men. She re-
read his letter. Then she glanced into her mirror.
“So much the better,” she remarked.
 CHAPTER XXIV
HER admirers had a sorry time of it for the next two weeks; she was
capricious, even irritable, absent-minded, and at no pains to conceal
that they bored her. Her appetite remained good, or Mrs.
Montgomery would have grown alarmed.
The answer to Cecil’s letter had required an entire day of anxious
thought. Her pen ran over with the emotions he had quickened; but
pride conquered, and she finally wrote him a gay friendly letter,
assuring him of a welcome in which curiosity would play no
insignificant part, but studiously concealing her burning interest.
She was profoundly thankful to the inspiration which dictated that
letter when his answer came. It was very brief, and its only
enthusiasm was inspired by the buffalo. There was not a mutually
personal line in it. He concluded by remarking that if he did not write
again, she could expect him any time just outside of a month. He
should go to Southern California first to visit some English ranchers,
whom he had known at Oxford, and to kill his grizzly.
Lee tore this letter into strips, and plunged into a desperate flirtation
with Randolph, giving him an unusual meed of dances at the little
parties of Menlo, making him get up at unearthly hours to ride with
her before his day in town—he detested riding—and driving every
evening to the station to meet him. He was puzzled, but inclined to
take the pleasant caprices of the gods without analysis. He was very
busy, and it was enough to know, as he sat at his table, his pencil
working at the thousand and one prosaic details of a huge iron
building he was designing, that his evenings and Sundays were to
be made radiant by the smiles of the most charming woman in the
world. He forgot Cecil Maundrell; and the future he tenaciously
desired seemed imminent.
 CHAPTER XXV
“HERE comes a tramp up the avenue again,” said Mrs. Montgomery,
with irritation. “That makes the second this week. I shall have to build
a lodge. Why can’t they go to the farmhouse? Tramps are very
trying.”
“He doesn’t walk like a tramp,” said Lee, “although his clothes
certainly are—” Being a trifle shortsighted, she raised her lorgnette.
She rose suddenly, turning her back to Mrs. Montgomery, and
descended the steps of the verandah. Her knees and hands shook
violently, and the blood rushed to her head; but she was some three
minutes reaching the stranger, who had lifted his cap, then plunged
his hands in his pockets, and at the end of that time her nerves were
in the leash of her will.
“Well, if it isn’t like you, Cecil Maundrell, to come in those awful
clothes!” she cried gaily. “Mrs. Montgomery took you for a tramp.”
He laughed nervously as he swung her hand to and fro. “We were
burnt out last night, and they’re all I’ve got left. I’ll go on to San
Francisco in a day or two and get some.”
“I don’t believe Aunty will let you in the house, much less sit down at
the table.”
“Really? How curious! I didn’t know you were so conventional out
here. But I’ll go on at once, if you say so.”
“No, no. Only make an elaborate enough apology to Mrs.
Montgomery, and she will be as nice as possible. But we’re not only
frightfully conventional out here, but rather sensitive. A duke came
down to a dinner-party in Menlo once in his shooting-jacket, and
we’ve never gotten over it.”
“What a bounder. I’ll go out and eat with the farm hands. I like the
rough and ready American very much.”
“I don’t know any, so I can’t argue. You look perfectly splendid, and
I’m so glad you’re tall. You really have changed very little, except that
you’ve lost your pretty complexion—although I prefer this. You make
other men look positively ill. Oh, Cecil, I am glad to see you!”
Her face and voice were animated by the friendliest feeling. Cecil
stared hard at her, the smile dying out of his eyes. “You are very
beautiful,” he said abruptly.
“I hear a carriage. Some people are coming to call. Let us get out of
the way—not that I’m ashamed of you, but you don’t want to meet
Mrs. Montgomery before a lot of other people.”
“I don’t want to meet her at all—or anybody else but yourself. To tell
the truth, it never occurred to me that there would be any one else,
and I knew you wouldn’t mind these old shooting rags. I do look like
a tramp. I really never thought about it. I remember people rather
stared at me in the train. A flashy-looking fellow in the smoking-car
asked me if I was looking for work, and I told him No, I was looking
for a fight. He said nothing more until we reached a station, when he
asked me to get out and take a drink.”
“Did you? I can’t imagine your unbending that far.”
“Oh, I take everybody as a matter of course, knocking about. I
accepted the drink and stood him another. After that I went to sleep
to get rid of him. Of course he wanted to talk—that is to say,
monologue.”
“Let us sit down here.”
They had left the avenue, and crossed a side garden. There were
two rustic chairs under a great oak. They took them, and faced each
other.
“Did you kill your grizzly?”
“No; not one has been heard of in the neighbourhood of San Luis
Obispo for three years. I never was so disappointed in my life. Now, I
suppose, there is no hope; it is too much to ask of men who have
been burnt out to bother about grizzlies. My other friends—the ones
I’ve been with for the last two years—didn’t come further West than
Montana.”
Lee had on a white summer frock, girdled with a ribbon the colour of
her eyes. Her black hair was coiled loosely. She was fully aware that
she looked very lovely.
“You are the only man living that would look for a grizzly first and for
me after,” she said with a certain arching of her brows and pouting of
her lips ... “Cecil, you always could stare harder than any one I ever
knew.”
“I believe I’ve thought quite as much about you as the grizzly.”
“Thanks!”
“No; but I am serious.” He looked away. Lee fancied that his triple
coat of tan really paled. “I’ve never been so upset in my life,” he
continued lucidly.
“It never did take you long to come to the point. What a relief—there
are not to be a half-dozen weeks of flirtatious fencing. Do come out
with it.”
He laughed, but without any great amount of ease. “I’ll be perfectly
frank,” he said. “I saw your photograph in New York; I nearly went off
my head. I lay awake all night. It was the first time any woman had
bowled me over. My two or three fancies were hardly worth recalling.
You see, I put your beauty with all I knew of you mentally, and of our
delightful companionship when you were older than most girls of
your age—and the sweetest little thing!—and the combination made
my brain whirl. Before morning I wrote you that letter——”
“Well?”
Lee was twirling her lorgnette, her eyes lowered. Cecil had not
removed his eyes from the horizon. He spoke jerkily, with an evident
effort.
“When I cooled down, I was sorry I had sent that letter,” he brought
out brutally, after an instant’s further hesitation. “You see, I had never
thought of you in that way at all, or I shouldn’t even have started for
California. I don’t believe in international marriages——”
“But, my dear Cecil,” exclaimed Lee, opening wide surprised eyes,
“we’re not going to marry! I settled all that long ago.”
Cecil was too perturbed and too masculine to mark the rapid change
of tactics. He turned his face about and stared at her. He was visibly
paler, and his eyes were almost black.
“You have not settled it as far as I’m concerned,” he said. “I knew it
was all up with me when you came toward me down that avenue.
I’ve done nothing but deliberate for five weeks; I’ve weighed every
pro and con; I’ve recalled every scene between my father and
stepmother; I’ve argued with myself on the folly of marrying anything
under a fortune; and the moment I saw you I knew that I had wasted
five weeks, and that I should marry you if you would have me.”
Lee’s eyes had returned to the study of her lap. Pride and passion
battled again. After a full moment’s silence, she looked up with so
sweet a smile that he leaned forward impulsively to take her hand.
But she drew it back.
“Cecil,” she said, “I forbid you to make love to me until you have
made me love you first. Of course I can’t say if I ever shall.” She
looked about vaguely, her lips still smiling. “But, at least, we start fair;
I don’t care a straw for any one else, and I’ve always liked you better
than anybody in the world. To-day is the twenty-sixth of April. You
may propose to me again on the twenty-sixth of May.”
He looked at her helplessly, his lips twitching. “You don’t care at all?”
he asked. His voice still thickened when he was agitated.
“How can I, Cecil—in that way—when I haven’t laid eyes on you for
ten years? You admit that I was only an abstraction to you before
you saw my picture. You could not expect more of me, and I never
even had a glimpse of a photograph. And women don’t take fire so
easily as men.” She prayed he would not catch her up in his arms
and kiss her. “I have not even been inspired to deliberation.” She
gave a little laugh just tipped with malice. “What would you think, I
wonder, if I accepted you on a moment’s notice.”
“You certainly wouldn’t have my excuse. What a guy I must be!” He
stood up with a sudden diffidence which made him look like a big
awkward boy, and Lee loved him the more.
“What time does the next train go to San Francisco?” he added. He
had taken out his watch.
“Twelve-ten.”
“I have just time to catch it. I’ll be back when I’ve got some decent
clothes. I suppose there are tailors in San Francisco—in Market
Street?”
“Go and see Randolph, Crocker Building. He will take you to his.”
“Thanks. Good-bye.”
He shook her hand, avoiding her eyes, and strode away. When he
reached the avenue, he plunged his hands into his pockets and
began to run. Lee found time to laugh at his picturesque lack of self-
consciousness before she turned and fled across the lane into the
friendly solitude of the Yorba woods.
 CHAPTER XXVI
HE returned three days later, clad in immaculate grey, a trunk in his
wake containing much smart linen and four suits of clothes, which
had been ordered at the best house in San Francisco by a
stockbroker who had retired from business and his country the day
before Cecil, with similar measurements and similar needs, was
presented to the tailor by Randolph.
Mrs. Montgomery had done the one thing possible under the
circumstances—she had asked Cecil to make her house his home
so long as he remained in that part of California. Her eyes were very
red on the morning after his first appearance, but she made no
comment to Lee, who spent the greater part of those three days by
herself, but appeared quite normal when with the family. Cecil had
gone at once to see and consult Randolph, who remarked, when he
came home that night, that the Englishman seemed a very good
sort, but that he should prefer not to walk down Kearney Street with
him again until he was properly rigged out. He really didn’t know why
they hadn’t been mobbed, and two imps of newsboys had made
audible remarks about “blarsted Britishers.”
“I don’t see why you can always tell an Englishman,” he added, with
some impatience. “To say nothing of his get-up to-day, look at the
difference between his figure and Coe’s. The clothes will fit
Maundrell to perfection, but his figure is no more like Coe’s than it’s
like mine. He’s a lean athletic Englishman, every inch of him; Coe
was thin and angular. It’s quite remarkable.”
“Is he very handsome?” asked Mrs. Montgomery faintly.
“I really couldn’t say. He looks like an Englishman—that’s all.”
Lee darted a swift side-glance; he was eating with his usual nervous
haste. She knew him better than in the old days, but could detect no
sign of agitation in him. In a moment he began to talk about a new
pair of carriage horses he had bought his mother; and during the
evening he asked Lee to play for him in the dark, as usual. Once she
turned her head suddenly and caught a fixed steely gleam from the
depths of his chair. She averted her eyes hastily, and gazed
thoughtfully at the keys, playing mechanically, with nothing of her
usual expression.
She always wore white in summer, in accordance with an unwritten
law of Menlo Park, and for the evening of Cecil’s second appearance
she selected her softest and airiest, one, moreover, that was cut
several inches below her throat, and one or two above her elbows.
Full-dress, except at the rare dinner-parties in honour of some-one-
with-letters, was tabooed in that exclusive borough. As Cecil came
from town with Randolph she left the honours of introduction to the
host, and did not make her appearance until a few minutes before
dinner. She found Mrs. Montgomery and Cecil amiably discussing
California, and Randolph gently jeering at them for their lack of
originality.
“Several volumes have been written on the ‘Resources of California,’
but the one to which she shall owe her permanent fame has never
had so much as a paragraph. It awaits its special biographer.”
“But there can be originality even on an exhausted theme,” said Lee,
who had shaken hands with Cecil, and was anxious to keep the
conversation light. “Captain Twining’s remark two days after his
arrival in California is already quite famous.” She glanced at Cecil,
and lifted her chin with defiant coquetry. “He said that he had only
heard of two things Californian before he came—Miss Tarleton and
the climate.”
“He wasn’t very polite to call you a thing,” said Cecil, laughing; he
seemed in excellent spirits.
“Perhaps he took her for a perfume or a flower,” said Randolph
quickly.
The two men measured each other with a swift glance.
“That was really very neat,” remarked Lord Maundrell. “You might
have blushed, Lee.”
“She has had too many compliments; she is quite spoiled for
anything less than downright uxoriousness.”
“Ah!” observed Lord Maundrell.
They went in to dinner. Cecil was not to be laughed out of his interest
in California; the grape industry had interested him during his brief
sojourn in the South, and he wanted to know all about it, from its
incipience to its finalities. Randolph, who knew little about the grape
industry, and cared less, answered in glittering generalities, and
headed him off to the subject of mission architecture. Cecil
immediately instituted a comparison between the results of Indian
labour and the characteristic edifices of Spain—more particularly of
Granada, and then branched off to the various divergences under
native and climatic influences to be found in South America. Of all
this Randolph knew practically nothing. Like most Americans, he
was a specialist, and had studied only that branch of his art
necessary to his own interests. But his mind was very nimble, and he
so successfully concealed from the Englishman his superficial
knowledge of the subject, that Lee, who followed the conversation
with rapt interest, did not know whom to admire most. She was
wondering if Cecil could make as brilliant a showing as Randolph on
next to nothing, when, in reply to a question of his host’s regarding
the gold mines of Peru, he replied indifferently:
“I don’t know anything about them. They didn’t interest me,” and
dismissed the subject; one upon which Randolph happened to have
some knowledge. He had invested heavily in a newly-discovered
mine of which one of his friends was secretary.
The conversation turned to politics. Randolph was at his best
analysing and illustrating the party differences, but when Cecil
questioned him about the genesis of the two parties, the constitution
of the United States, and the historic significance of the various
presidents, even generalities failed him, and he was obliged to
confess himself nonplussed.
“Upon my word,” he exclaimed laughing, “I do believe that the only
thing I remember about United States history is its covert admonition
to grow up as fast as I could and lick the English.”
Lee and Cecil laughed simultaneously. “Have you ever told the story
of my attempt to lick the United States?” asked Cecil. “That defeat
rankled for years.”
“Never!”
Cecil told the story very well. It was evident that his bitterness had
passed, and he concluded:
“The odd part of it all is, that although you Americans beat us, it is
you who are bitter, and not ourselves. It was the same way with
those boys. They gave me sour disapproving glances every time
they met me until I left. On the other hand, I nearly thrashed the life
out of a man in Montana, and I never made such an enthusiastic
friend.”
“Oh, we have to be bullied,” said Randolph frankly. “We love to brag
and boast and swagger. You see we are such an extraordinary
nation that we can’t help being a little cocky, and the only man we
really respect is the one who lays us on our back with a black eye
and a nose out of joint. We always get up—nothing can keep an
American on his back—but we go to our graves with a wondering
admiration of the muscle, mental or physical, that floored us.”
“That is very interesting,” said Cecil thoughtfully, “very.” He added in
a moment: “I fancy the bitterness would have died out by this time, in
spite of our failure to keep the finest of our colonies, but for our
diplomacy, which is a trifle too subtle and sinuous to please the rest
of the world. I don’t know that the United States stands alone in her
antagonism.” And he laughed.
Randolph knew less about English diplomacy than he did about the
past history of American politics, but he made a rapid calculation: if
he led Cecil on, the Englishman, with his exact and profound
knowledge, would distinguish himself and win the grateful admiration
of the woman. On the other hand, unless he kept him talking, he
should be called upon for information which he had always
considered superfluous in an American who had but one short life in
which to “get there,” and which was of no particular interest to
himself; he had cut his college course down to one year in order to
make the most of his youthful energies, and to run no risk of losing
Lee Tarleton. Moreover, if he drew his guest out, he should not only
be doing his duty as a host, but Lee’s approval for himself would be
as large as her admiration of his rival. There was more than a
chance, clever as she was, that she would give him full credit for
generosity and for the courtesy of his fathers. He made up his mind
in an instant, threw out an observation of epigrammatic vagueness
on the diplomacy of England, and in ten minutes had Cecil
monopolising the conversation, under the impression that he was
forced into an argument.
Lee forgot her dinner, and listened intensely. She had heard men talk
more brilliantly—for Cecil had cultivated none of the graces of
oratory, and of the epigram he appeared to have a healthy scorn—
but she had never heard any one talk who knew so well what he was
talking about, and who yet suggested that he was merely skimming
up the spray of a subject whose deeps were trite to him straight
down to its skeletons and flora. His knowledge of English diplomacy
suggested an equally minute knowledge of the diplomatic history of
every country into which England had run her horns. He talked
without priggishness, rather as if he were used to discussing the
subject with men who were as well grounded as himself.
As they left the dining-room, Lee lingered behind a moment with
Randolph.
“It was awfully nice of you,” she said. “You like to do the talking
yourself, and England has never interested you much.”
“I knew that it would interest you. I was bored to extinction; but it is
time you had a little variety.”
“You are good.” She hesitated a moment. “He has real intellect,
hasn’t he?” she asked.
“He knows things. He can knock the spots out of us when it comes to
solid information. But in a contest of wits I’d engage him in a match
without any qualms. He’s straight out from the shoulder, and if he
were stacked up against American nimbleness and adaptability for
any great length of time, he’d go under.”
“He’s quick enough.”
“With an answer—yes; but that’s not what I mean.”
 CHAPTER XXVII
THEY had remained longer at dinner than usual, and when Lee went
out to the verandah, she found Mr. and Mrs. Brannan and Mr.
Trennahan, a New Yorker who had recently married and settled in
Menlo. Cecil was at her elbow in a moment.
“Let us take a walk,” he said. “Will it be rude to leave these people?”
“Oh, no; we are very informal among ourselves, and they are Mrs.
Montgomery’s friends rather than mine.”
They crossed the grounds, entered Fair Oaks Lane, and walked
toward the hills. It was moonlight, and the redwoods on the crest of
the mountain were sharp against the sky.
“Can I smoke a cigar?”
“Of course.”
“Should not you have something else round you?”
“This shawl is camel’s hair and very warm. How do you like
Randolph?”
“A very decent chap. Is he in love with you?”
“Why is it that when a man admires a woman he fancies every other
man is in love with her?”
“That’s not answering my question. Not that it is necessary. No man
could grow up with you and not love you.”
“You are learning to pay compliments. You will be sending me candy
and flowers next.”
“I’ll never send you candy, nor anything that’s not good for you.”
“Have you spent the last three days regretting that you proposed on
Monday?”
“What an ass you must think me. I proposed, and that was the end of
it; my only regret was that I did it so badly. I have spent the last three