198 The Trout s of America 



to North American waters, for it is now the con- 

 sensus of opinion among American ichthyolo- 

 gists that these fish originated in Asia, crossing 

 Behring Straits or the adjacent sea, and passing 

 southward and eastward to the Upper Columbia, 

 thence to the Yellowstone and Missouri rivers ; 

 from the Missouri southward to the Platte and 

 the Arkansas, and from there being generally dis- 

 tributed over the Pacific slope from the Fraser 

 River southward. Be this as it may, and at best 

 it is merely an ichthyic theory ; we find the origi- 

 nal parent fish, after leaving their Asian Eden, 

 multiplying in Western waters into twenty-four 

 species of trout, all black spotted save one, the 

 Dolly Varden. East of the Mississippi thirteen 

 species and subspecies of the charr-trouts exist, 

 including the lake trout or togue {Namaycush), 

 which is also found in the extreme northwest 

 as far as the Arctic Circle, and excluding the 

 Dolly Varden, which is a charr of the Pacific 

 slope. 



In Great Britain and on the eastern continent 

 not less than ten species of trout and charrs are 

 known under specific classification. We find 

 non-migratory trout in the waters of Hungary, 

 Switzerland, France, Bavaria, Italy, Norway, 



