CHAPTER VI 



THE GRAYLING AND THE SMELT 



HE Grayling, or Thymallidae. The small family of 

 Thymallidce, or grayling, is composed of finely organized 

 fishes allied to the trout, but differing in having the 

 frontal bones meeting on the middle line of the skull, thus 

 excluding the frontals from contact with the supraoccipital. 

 The anterior half of the very high dorsal is made up of un- 

 branched simple rays. There is but pne genus, Thymallus, 

 comprising very noble game-fishes characteristic of sub-arctic 

 streams. 



The grayling, Thymallus, of Europe, is termed by Saint 

 Ambrose "the flower of fishes." The teeth on the tongue, 



FIG. 80. Alaska Grayling, Thymallus signifer Richardson. Xulato, Alaska. 



found in all the trout and salmon, are obsolete in the grayling. 

 The chief distinctive peculiarity of the genus Thymallus is the 

 great development of the dorsal fin, which has more rays (20 

 to 24) than are found in any of the Salmonida, and the 

 fin is also higher. All the species are gaily colored, the dorsal 

 fin especially being marked with purplish or greenish bands 



