100 SALMONID.R. 



in making tliese leaps, the muscular efforts of the animal do 

 really impart to it a curvilinear form. 



It is believed that the utmost limit of perpendicular height 

 which they can attain is fourteen feet ; but their perseverance 

 is as remarkable as their strength, and though they fail time 

 after time, and fall back into the stream below, they remain 

 but a few moments quiescent, to recruit their strength, before 

 they renew their efforts ; and they generally succeed in the end, 

 although they are said sometimes to kill themselves by the 

 violence of their own efforts to ascend, and are frequently 

 captured in consequence of falling on the rocks. 



I once watched a Salmon for above an hour endeavouring to 

 pass a mill-dam on the river Wharfe, a Salmon river in the 

 West Riding of Yorkshire. The dam was of great height, 

 thirteen or fourteen feet at least, and was formed with a sort of 

 step midway, on which the water fell, making a double cascade. 

 While I was watching him, the fish, which was, I suppose, of 

 some seven or eight pounds, made above twenty leaps, con- 

 stantly alighting from his spring about midway the upper shoot 

 of the water, and being constantly swept back into the eddy at 

 its foot. After a pause of about a couple of minutes, he would 

 try it again ; and such was his vigour and endurance, that he 

 at last succeeded in surmounting the formidable obstacle ; and 

 to my great pleasure — for I had become really interested in his 

 success — went on his way rejoicing. 



The voracity of the Salmon is excessive ; and yet, from the 

 singular fact that their stomachs are invariably, or almost inva- 

 riably, found entirely empty, none of the numerous examiners 

 have been able to satisfy themselves what constitutes its prin- 



