THE COOKERY OF THE SALMON 193 



place. Nothing short of sheer impossibility will bar 

 the rush of his homely affections. Follow him in his 

 progress up some rapid Scottish stream. He will wait 

 in fretted impatience in some stagnant back-water till 

 the sluices in the cruives are opened of a Sunday. 

 Then unsabbatically he spends what should be the 

 day of rest in super-salmonic efforts to make up for 

 lost time. He splashes up shallows in sun or starlight, 

 making the water fly behind him in silvery spray. He 

 faces the foaming and flashing cascades ; and he 

 climbs artificial ladders, let down to assist him, with 

 the agility of a monkey. See him in low water below 

 the half-submerged reef, locally known as the ' Salmon 

 Leap.' He makes the effort to bound over again and 

 again, bending himself together tail to head, like a bird 

 shooting arrow-like upwards from the bow's elasticity. 

 Of course, if the efforts are indefinitely baulked by 

 protracted drought and the shrinking water, he falls 

 back in the sulks, losing heart and condition. Conse- 

 quently he is only in prime order when he is coming 

 in clean-run from the sea, or coasting the stake nets 

 in his quest for the natal stream, when he is 

 striving to rid himself of the parasitical sea lice which 

 are the sure signs of his excellence. Later in the 

 season, after idling away existence in pools that are 

 prisons, with no serious pre-occupation but family 



