184 JAMES HOGG'S EXPERIMENTS. [CHAP. v. 



110 hesitation in considering the parr not only distinct, but 

 one of the best and most constantly marked species we have." 

 The first person who " took a thought about the matter" 

 i.e. as to whether the parr was or was not the young of the 

 salmon and arrived at any solid conclusion, was James Hogg, 

 the Ettrick Shepherd, who, in his usual eccentric way, took 

 some steps to verify his opinions. He had, while herding 

 his sheep, many opportunities of watching the fishing-streams, 

 and, like most of his class, he wielded his fishing-rod with 

 considerable dexterity. While angling in the tributaries of 

 some of the Border salmon-streams he had often caught the 

 parr as it was changing into the smolt stage, and had, after 

 close observation, come to the conclusion that the little parr 

 was none other than the infant salmon. Mr. Hogg did not 

 keep his discovery a secret, and the more his facts were con- 

 troverted by the naturalists of the day the louder became 

 his proclamations. He had suspected all his life that parr 

 were salmon in their first stage. He would catch a parr with 

 a few straggling scales upon it ; he would look at this fish 

 arid think it queer ; instantly he would catch another a little 

 better covered with silver scales, but all loose, and not adher- 

 ing to the body. Again he would catch a smolt, manifestly a 

 smolt, all covered with the white silver scales, yet still rather 

 loose upon its skin, and these would come off in his hand. 

 On removing these he found the parr, with the blue finger- 

 marks below the new scales ; and that these were young sal- 

 mon then became as manifest to the shepherd as that a lamb, 

 if suffered to live, would become a sheep. Wondering at this, 

 he marked a great number of the lesser fish, arid offered re- 

 wards (characteristically enough of whisky) to the peasantry 

 to bring him any fish that had evidently undergone the change 

 predicted by him. Whenever this conclusion was settled in 

 his mind, the Shepherd at once proclaimed his new-gained 

 knowledge. ''What will the fishermen of Scotland think/' 



