CHARACTERISTICS AND IDENTITY OF LAKE SALMON. Ill 



content himself in fresh water; or that by some mischances, he had become "degenerate" 

 in size, beauty, and succulency; and unworthy of his regal progenitors; or whether he 

 was not, after all, truly a variety of lake trout. So much speculation, we repeat, has been 

 indulged in, that it would be a waste of our space to review the pros and cons of the ar- 

 gument, suffice it to say that one most excellent authority. Dr. A. C. Hamlin, pro- 

 nounces it identical with the sea salmon, and exhibiting no radical differences, except in 

 the one pecuUarity that it does not go to salt water. The bony structure and its fin 

 system are precisely the same as those of salmo solar. Therefore we are at hberty to 

 call it a salmon. 



'And yet, if we examine its fin system and compare it with that of the togue, we find 

 that the two formulae vary but shghtly ; which see : 



'Landlocked salmon — Br. 12; P. 15; V. 9; A. 10; D. 12; C. 19. 



'Togue — Br. 12; P. 12-13; V. 9; A. 11-12; D. 13; C. 19. 



'Now as greater variations are found in lake trout which are declared to be identical 

 species, we are equally at liberty to call the Salmo sebago a lake trout, or "sebago trout,'" 

 as some name it. We leave it to those who pay their money, to take their choice, and 

 herewith dismiss the subject. Either conclusion is favored by facts of its biographical 

 history. Within two years we have taken this fish in Canada where there were no 

 obstructions to its passage to the sea; and twenty-five years ago we took the same fish 

 in Maine, where obstructions did not exist but now do. The argument as to its involun- 

 tary restriction to fresh water therefore has no weight. It would not go to the sea if it 

 could; it will not when it can. ' (Italics the present writer's.) 



But in 1892, Hallock (1892, p. 25) wrote: 'The Wananishe of the Upper Saguenay 

 River, which were long beUeved to keep exclusively to fresh water, although they had 

 direct access to the sea, have recently been ascertained to be simply a distinct class of 

 the Sea Salmon, peculiar to its own waters, Kke all the others, and of precisely the same 

 habits and idiosyncrasies; only the peculiar conformation of the Saguenay region and 

 the extreme depth of the river have hitherto prevented such practical observations as 

 were essential to estabhsh the facts. In places the Saguenay is one thousand feet deep, 

 with an extreme average depth for sixty miles from its mouth, and the Wananishe 

 (Wa-na-nish, in the Indian vernacular) are not seen until they reach the riffs of the 

 chute, or Grande Discharge, which constitutes the outlet of Lake St. John'. 



In an article entitled Memoranda on Landlocked Salmon, in 1884, Atkins (18846, p. 

 341-342) wrote: 'There have been thought to be several distinct species, or at least 

 several naturaUsts, finding landlocked salmon in this or that district, have thought them 

 new species and have called them Salmo sebago, S. gloveri, etc. Within a few years 

 Dr. Bean and others in Washington have carefully compared them with S. salar and 

 find no specific differences.' 



In 1892 Creighton (1892, p. 81-86) wrote: 'It used to be an article of faith with 

 naturahsts and anglers that a salmon — using the word in its everyday sense, not in 

 the technical one of Salmo, which generic name includes many very different fish, some 

 of them merely trout — is a salt-water fish which comes into fresh-water rivers to 



