68 Breeding Salmon and Trout. 



one would ever hatch out. The eggs of salmon are about the 

 size of medium peas, of a lovely flesh colour, tra'nsparent, and 

 enclosed in a membrane quite as fine as gold-beater's skin. They 

 will not endure anything like rough handling, and I was fairly at 

 my wits' end what to do. However, taking a large camel's hair 

 paint brush and gently stirring up the mud I did at last get rid of 

 most of it, but it was a long and weary business, and I almost 

 began to wish that I had not dabbled in salmon rearing and had left 

 the fish to attend to their own duties. After this, for about a fort- 

 night all went well. Then sharp frost set in, and all my time was 

 taken up in keeping the boxes clear of ice. I used to come back 

 into the house so numb with cold that I seemed to have lost all 

 feeling, and was often reminded of a certain bishop of whom an 

 amusing story is told. He was an old man, and was sometimes 

 attacked with a loss of sensation in his limbs. If he grasped his 

 arm or his knee he would find that he had no feeling in it. The 

 doctor told him that whenever he found that to be the case he 

 must at once take a dose of some potion which he always kept by 

 him. He was a genial and amusing' man, and one day when he 

 was at a dinner party he was suddenly observed to turn pale and 

 look very anxious. He said in a weak low voice — " Pray, excuse 

 me, I must go home. I have that terrible feeling of numbness 

 come over me. I have been grasping my knee for some minutes 

 and have no sensation in it at all." " Excuse me, my lord," said an 

 elderly lady who was sitting next him, " I do not think you need 

 feel any alarm. It is my knee that you have been grasping for 

 the last five minutes !" 



When the frost was gone and I could examine my eggs again 

 to my great alarm I found that a few were dead ; they had become 

 quite white and opaque. Others had white spots upon them, 

 which day by day spread fast over the inside of the membrane or 

 covering of the egg. As soon as this white substance had spread 

 all over the egg it was dead. 



This brings me to the most interesting part of my experience. 

 It struck me that perhaps the water was too cold, but how to 

 warm it was a problem which I could not solve. So I set to work 

 to ng-up a small hospital for sick eggs by the dining-room fire. 

 A large bath which had a tap in one end of it formed my 

 cistern ; under the tap I placed a small tin tray about six inches 

 long and four wide and about three inches deep ; glass rods 



