28 THE SALMON 



of the salmon have multiplied twenty-fold, their nets 

 and engines have developed and improved inefficiency ; 

 and they have learned to manage them with greater skill 

 and knowledge of the habits of the fish, and its course 

 from the sea along the estuary and to the spawning 

 beds. The old Scandinavian legend ascribes the 

 invention of salmon-nets to the principle of evil, and 

 relates that by a just retribution, like Perillus and 

 other scoundrels, the inventor perished by his own 

 wicked contrivance — 



Infelix imbuit auctor opus. 



Loki, the god alluded to, had carried on his 

 various tricks with impunity for a long time, but at 

 last his mischievous pranks culminated in the death 

 of the innocent and beautiful Baldur, whose virtues 

 and good qualities made him as obnoxious to his 

 destroyer as Aristides was to the Athenians. Every- 

 thing on earth and sea had been sworn to do him no 

 harm ; but the ingenious Loki fashioned an arrow 

 out of mistletoe, which, owing to its peculiar habit of 

 growth, had been omitted from the solemn league 

 and covenant, and putting it into the hand of the 

 blind god Hodur, urged him to shoot, which he did, 

 with fatal effect. This was too much for the for- 

 bearance of even the most easy-going gods, and they 



