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inches. They would detect their prey at a considerable dis- 

 tance and slowly rise to meet it as it floated to them, and then 

 a sudden flash, and they were back to their respective resting 

 places. The deviation from the point where they lay was, 

 from side to side across the stream, hardly ever but a few 

 inches up or down. One day, when they were rising with 

 more than usual frequency, I carefully crept out on a pro- 

 jecting log until I was nearly over them, and could watch 

 their every movement, and, with watch in hand, counted the 

 " rises" of the larger one for fifteen minutes. In this time he 

 came to the surface and secured his prey fifty times. Some- 

 times he would rise nearly to the surface and then slowly 

 settle down again, but whenever he actually seized anything 

 he was back to his haunt again with a motion so quick the 

 eye could scarcely follow him. After considerable observation 

 I could detect the particular insect I was sure he would rise 

 for, sometimes before he would show any motion in that 

 direction. Watching his quick, unerring sight, and his ability 

 to detect what was food, and what was not, led me into some 

 generalizations on what their food really was, that were new 

 to me. 



In eviscerating fish for any purpose, I have always been in 

 the habit of examining the contents of the stomach, and the 

 stomach of the grayling had always puzzled me by the quantity 

 of vegetable matter so often found in them; but the a priori 

 conclusion was that he was necessarily a carnivorous, or insec- 

 tivorous fish ; the thought that he was a vegetarian as well, 

 never occurred to me. I had observed that the fronds of the 

 white cedar — arbor vitce — were quite usually among the con- 

 tents of the stomach, but I had always considered it as some- 

 thing adventitious, an accident, occurring in the procuring of 

 his food, and not deliberately taken. But a somewhat singular 

 circumstance that occurred upon this last expedition staggered 

 me somewhat. On tHe afternoon of the day of my arrival, 

 after the tent was pitched, and camp life organized, I proceeded 

 to a pool below a flooding dam near camp, thinking I could 

 secure enough grayling for the supper of myself and little 

 daughter, who accompanied me. I succeeded in securing two 



