323 
Mr Branper, in The Field, remarked upon having observed 
during the preceding summer some holes scooped out in the 
gravel close to the mouth of the small river Lossie (near the 
Spey) and within the reach of the salt water, and here he found 
in January, 1882, a few salmon working at their redds, which 
were within a mile anda half of the sea, and covered once a 
fortnight, at spring tides, with quite salt and undrinkable 
water for perhaps an hour’s time. 
Several correspondents to The Field and elsewhere appear 
to be sanguine that in time they will hatch salmon in such 
localities; and in fact, it has been asserted that they must 
have done so in the Yorkshire Esk. 
Under the conflicting accounts representing sea water as 
certain death in all instances wherein the experiments had 
been brought to a conclusion, and only conjecture being the 
ground for a belief that Salmonoid eggs would hatch in such a 
situation, I thought it well worth endeavouring to come to a 
decision onthe point. My experiments were certainly primitive 
ones, and it may be objected that the ova being in tum- 
blers and the water being only changed once daily, placed 
them under unnatural conditions, but the eggs similarly placed 
in tumblers of fresh water hatched. Also two trout eggs kept 
in brackish water at the specific gravity of 1008° (except for 
two days at 1019°) from January 9th hatched February 28th 
and March Ist, but one had dropsy of the sac, apparently 
due to the medium in which they had been kept, It would be 
better if in future experiments the water be kept flowing. 
WHAT IS A PAR? 
The young of the salmon in Acts of Parliament were 
formerly designated as fry and smolts, while of late years the 
term par has been commonly used, and which has been said to 
be calculated to mislead, because there are salmon par and 
trout par. This brings us therefore to the consideration of 
what isa par? And I think a short history of the controversy 
this question has raised will be interesting, for in such Zoolo- 
gists, fishermen, learned divines, doctors, lawyers, poachers, in 
