232 BRITISH FRESH-WATER FISHES 
and incapable of digesting food. Dr. Barton, while agreeing 
that the stomach ceased to discharge its normal functions, 
conclusively proved that what the Committee had interpreted as 
a morbid affection during life, was really a stage of post mortem 
decomposition.* It is satisfactory to note that the Committee 
have heartily accepted his correction of their mistake, and that 
a paper by Dr. Barton has been printed as Appendix III. to 
the Twentieth Annual Report of the Scottish Fishery Board, 
showing his concurrence with the Committee in their inter- 
pretation of the symptoms as those of prolonged fasting. 
In another place Dr. Barton, after examining nearly two 
hundred salmon in 1899, affirmed his belief that “the salmon 
who reaches our rivers has begun a long physiological fast,” 
and agreed with Dr. Noel Paton in finding “ how feeble the 
peptogenic powers of the upper part of the digestive tract in 
salmon become when the fish enters the rivers.” + Ina later 
paper the same observer has given the result of his examina- 
tion of kelt salmon, both from the tidal and upper waters. 
In every case the stomach was quite empty and contracted, 
‘showing no very recent feeding, yet there was just sufficient 
material in the lower bowel to confirm (? strengthen) the 
suspicion that food had been digested. . . . It is very evident 
that kelts do not feed with the frequency that sportsmen would 
have us believe.” + Even this cautious inference is limited by 
Dr. Barton’s proviso in his report upon kelts from the Tweed : 
“If staining with osmic acid is to be taken as proof that fat 
cells in the lacteal system actually contain fat, then the sections 
from tidal kelts must be taken to mean that these fish have 
absorbed nourishment within recent times.” 
It is notoriously difficult to prove a negative ; but, before 
acting upon Professor Seeley’s authority, and proclaiming kelts 
to be mischievous vermin, devouring their own young, it is 
* Journal of Anatomy and Physiology, April, 1900, pp. 298-9. 
+ Lbid. 
{ Zbid., January, 1902, pp. 142-6. 
