CHANGES OF COLOUR. 65 



others, the great natural history lately published by the State 

 of New York, the illustrations of which are below contempt 

 as works of art, ancl^ in a scientific view, utterly useless and 

 uncharacteristic. 



After they have gained the upper and shallow parts of the 

 rivers, preparatory to the deposition of their spawn, the colours 

 of the Salmon are materially altered ; the male becomes marked 

 on the cheek with orange-coloured stripes, the lower jaw 

 acquires a peculiar projection and turns upward at the point in 

 a hard, hooked, cartilaginous excrescence, which, when the 

 mouth is closed, occupies a hollow between the intermaxillary 

 bones. 



The body of the fish becomes greenish above, with the sides 

 of an orange hue, fading into yellowish green on the belly, and 

 the spots assume a sanguine hue, the dorsal and caudal fins 

 being more or less spotted. The females at this season are even 

 darker than on their arrival in fresh water. 



The males are at this period termed E,ed-fish in Great Britain, 

 and the females Black-fish ; and they are so designated in the 

 very salutary enactments which, in that country, by protecting 

 the fish during their season of breeding, have preserved them 

 from extirpation; enactments which, as cannot be too much 

 regretted or too strongly reprobated, the recalcitrative and 

 over-independent spirit of our people will not tolerate, much 

 less obey. 



The time will come, when the population at large will deplore 

 this foolish and discreditable spirit ; when, like him who slew 

 the goose which laid the golden eggs, they find that by their 

 own ultra-democratic spirit, they are deprived entirely and 



