The Brook Trout 299 



which a downpour twelve or more inches in 

 volume is ceaselessly passing, and, in strong con- 

 trast with this muscular attainment, and appar- 

 ently enjoying the relief from a morning's work, 

 like a schoolboy in his noonday's recess, this 

 trout can be seen in a quiet pool above the 

 dam disporting and leaping leisurely and lazily 

 from the water ; and I have found them when at 

 play — it can be called by no other name — to 

 disdain all feathered or natural lures ; they are 

 having a holiday, and a full stomach would, as 

 it were, handicap their acrobatic enjoyment. 

 When the nuptial season is over, our mountain 

 charr goes down-stream to deeper water, often 

 fifty to one hundred miles below the spawning 

 bed, to recuperate from the effects of reproduc- 

 tion, and early in the spring months can be taken 

 miles below the confluents in which it repro- 

 duced its kind and lived the greater part of its 

 life. 



No other fish known to anglers possess habits 

 so free from grossness as the brook trout of the 

 East. His primary need is oxygen, and he seeks 

 it where it is found in greatest quantities — the 

 upper reaches of strongly aerated mountain 

 streams. There you will find him in the full 



