Smklts. 



MUSEUM OF ANIMATED NATURE. 



159 



►:ver, we must refer to works which professedly treat 

 on the subject of anghng. 



We may here observe that in LouE:h Neagh, and 

 other loughs in Ireland, a variety of tlie trout, called 

 the Gillaroo. which attains to a considerable size, 

 is found. The internal surface of the stomach of 

 one examined by Mr. Yarrell presented an indurated 

 cuticle, but the parietes were not thicker than those 

 of other trouts : the teeth are small, but in number 

 and situation like those of the ordinary kind. 



Deformed trout with the upper jaw truncated, or 

 stunted in growth, and the lower jaw protruding, 

 occur in some of the lakes in Wales, and have been 

 taken also in a small loch called Loclidow near 

 Pitmain in Inverness-shiie. They are of small size : 

 a specimen from Lochdow is in the Museum of the 

 Zool. Soc. 



The trout is too well known to need a minute 

 detail of form and colouring. 



2448. — The Northern Char, ok Charr 



(Salmo umbla, Linn.). Salmo Alpinus, Pennant ; 

 Ombre Chevalier of the Lake of Geneva. 



When Walton published his ' Angler ' he stated his 

 belief that the char was only to be found as a British 

 fish in Lake Windermere. This, however, is not 

 correct : it inhabits many of the lakes of Cumber- 

 land, Westmoreland, and Lancashire, as Keswick, 

 Crummock Water, Buttefmere, Coniston, &c. ; it is 

 also found in many of the lochs of Scotland, a.s well 

 as of Ireland, as Loughs Esk, Egesh, Neagh, Dan, 

 &c. The lakes of the Tyrol are famous lor char. 

 Speaking of this fish, Sir H. Davy says: — "They 

 Generally haunt deep cool lakes, and are seldom 

 found at the surface till late in the autumn.'' At 

 this period they will take either fly or minnow, and 

 he mentions, as something remarkable, having 

 caught a char in summer in one of the beautiful 

 small deep lakes of the upper Tyrol, but it was 

 where a cool stream entered from the mountain, and 

 the fish did not rise, but swallowed the artificial fly 

 under water. 



Char afford the angler but little sport ; yet the 

 fly-fi>her whipping for trout, which often abound in 

 the same lakes, occasionally hooks one of the former, 

 but it is by no means a common occurrence. 



Except at the spavining season, November and 

 December, the char never leaves the deep clear 

 water of the lake ; at that period, however, they 

 make their way up the rivers, preferring those with 

 a rocky channel : as an instance in point, Mr. Yar- 

 rell remarks that of the two principal feeders of 

 Windermere (viz. the Rothay and Brathay), the Ro- 

 thay has a sandy bottom, but the channel of the 

 Brathay is rocky. Before merging into the lake, 

 these streams unite, at the western corner of the 

 head of the lake, and the shoals of char entering to 

 spawn, push their way up both of these rivers, but 

 those fish which have ascended the sandy-bedded 

 Rothay (a river to which the trout gives the pre- 

 ference), finding it unsuitable, invarialjly return, and 

 pass up the rocky channel of the Brathay, where 

 they deposit their eggs. 



Fig. 244S) represents a view of Lake Windermere, 

 celebrated for the beauty of the surrounding scenery 

 and the excellence of its finny tenants. 



From some cause or other, the char, even at the 

 same season of the year, exhibit great differences in 

 their tints and the intensity of their colour. Hence 

 the terms Case Char, Gilt Char, Red Char, and Sil- 

 ver Char, which have been applied to the different 

 varieties. Food, age, or individual vigour may in 

 some measure perhaps modify the tints ; but after 

 all the explanation is not very ea,sy. According to 

 M. Jurine, in the Lake of Geneva the I'eniales are 

 the finest in colour, but Mr. Mascall (in ' Mag. Nat. 

 Hist.' April, 1835) states that in the Lake Enner- 

 dale, Cumberland, he found the males of the richest 

 hue. 



The char is not a large fish ; it seldom exceeds 

 twelve or fourteen inches in length, though some 

 occasionally attain to eighteen inches, and even two 

 feet. As a delicacy for the table, it is undoubtedly 

 one of the first of fresh-water fish, combining the 

 flavour of the trout with that of the mullet. From 

 a correspondent to the ' Penny Magazine,' (April 

 25, 1840,) experienced in char-fishing, and a lover 

 of the beauties of scenery, no less than of the angle, 

 we quote the following : — 



"On account of these interesting and valuable 

 fish, some sections of both Windermere and (Joniston 

 I.ake» rent pretty high as fisheries ; and although 

 they do not yield any great quantities, the price 

 tliese fish command in the market commonly remu- 

 nerates, in a moderate degree, the persons employed 

 in the fisheries. The common size of the Winder- 

 mere char certainly does not, on the average, equal 

 half a pound each : some few are caught that weigh 

 a pound, or something more; but, probably, six 

 ounces would be nearer the average weight of those 

 that are annually taken. On account of their small 

 iize, it will at once appear obvious thai they are not 

 well adapted for being dressed and brought to table, 



in the ordinary way, that is boiled, — neither are they 

 commonly broiled or dressed as a pan fish, and, 

 when they are so, they are scarcely, if at all, supe- 

 rior to good trout. They possess a flavour, how- 

 ever, that connoisseurs seem greatly to admire ; and 

 the flesh when dressed has a rich and inviting ap- 

 pearance, being beautifully flaky, and of a deep 

 orange tinge. But the general way of dressing these 

 fish is that of potting — that is, seasoning them with 

 certain condiments alter they have been stewed and 

 the bones taken out, and afterwards placing them in 

 courses in shallow pots (hence potting), of seven, 

 eight, or nine inches in diameter, and pouring the 

 finest melted fresh butter over the fish until they 

 are well covered, and thus secured from the action 

 of the air. They are so highly seasoned, that with 

 this simple covering of butter, the pots containing 

 the char may be sent to any part of the kingdom, 

 and the fish will remain untainted for some months. 

 This enables the persons connected with the char 

 fisheries to send them to the best markets, our lux- 

 urious metropolis being undoubtedly at the head of 

 the list. They are usually sold in half-guinea and 

 guinea pots. 



" Disavowing all malice or ill-will towards the char- 

 potters of Bowness, Ambleside, Coniston, and others 

 in the vicinity of those lakes where this profitable 

 business is carried on, I cannot abstain from stating 

 that which I know to be an undeniable fact, namely, 

 that in many cases a smaller quantity of char is 

 mixed with a larger quantity of trout, or some other 

 inferior fish, and the adulterated pots then sold as 

 genuine char. This is only, it is urged, a common 

 trick with most manufacturers, and not considered 

 any serious imposition to substitute a few nice plump 

 trout in the place of as many char. An acquaint- 

 ance of mine, who resided on the banks of Winder- 

 mere, and who possessed opportunities of ascer- 

 taining the produce of the fisheries in real char, as 

 well as the quantities exported from thence, in pots 

 alone, amused himself with making calculations, 

 and the result was, that he found nearly three times 

 the quantity exported that were actually caught. 



'•Except in the spawning season, the common 

 haunts of these fish are in the clear and deep water ; 

 and the usual way of taking them is in sunken nets, 

 or trammels, as they are called, which are furnished 

 with bait to allure the tish ; and which sometimes 

 remain set for several days before any of them are 

 enticed into the snare. Their haunts are generally 

 badly calculated for employing drag nets, on account 

 of the rocky nature of those lakes. It has already 

 been stated that these fish do not afford the angler 

 much amusement ; nevertheless they are now angled 

 for far more than they formerly were. An expert 

 angler, however, may think himself fortunate if he 

 succeed in killing more than a dozen during the 

 day. They are occasionally allured to the surface 

 by a templing artificial fly ; but trolling with a 

 small minnow several feet below the surface is a 

 more likely mode of not being forced to leave the 

 fishing-ground with an entirely empty fishing- 

 basket. 



"In its shape this fish approaches that perfect 

 symmetry for which many of the Salmo species are 

 so very remarkable ; not differing materially from 

 the commcm trout, though, perhaps, a little more 

 slender and tapering than a trout I hat is plump and 

 well fed. The colour of the red char — for there is 

 another variety called case char, and the fishermen 

 would make out a third, which they call gilt char — 

 may be described as follows : The head terminates 

 in rather a blunt point, the under jaw scarcely at all 

 projecting. The pupil of the eye is black, in a sil- 

 ver iris, surrounded with a circle of gold. The body 

 is covered with very minute scales. The dorsal fin, 

 which is yellow, is marked with a few dark spots; 

 the back is dark with a peculiarly beautil'ul green- 

 ish cast, shading into the most delicate while on the 

 lower parls, and tinted with a bluish-like hue that is 

 difficult to describe. All the fins, except the dorsal, 

 are reddish; and during the season of spawning, the 

 belly for the most part becomes as red as the fins. 

 The body all over is sprinkled with pale spots, of a 

 considerable size for so small a fish." 



The Welsh Char, or Torgoch (red-belly), found in 

 Lyn Cawellyn, and a piece of wafer near Barmouth 

 in Merionethshire, called " Coss-y-gedawl," is a dis- 

 tinct species ; it is a deeper and shorter fish with 

 a larger eye and teeth and more ample fins than the 

 Windermere species. It is described and figured 

 by Donovan, and also by Mr. Yarrell under the title 

 of Salmo savelinus. 



24.50. — The Great Grey Trout 



(Salmo ferox). Lake Trout, Salmo lacustris, Ber- 

 kenhout. 



This noble species, which according to M. Agassiz 

 differs from any of the large Continental species, is 

 a native of many of the larger and deeper lakes of 

 Scotland and Ireland. It occurs in Loch Awe, 

 Loch Laggan, Lochs Shin, Loyal, and Assynf, in 

 Lough Neagh, in Ireland, where it is called Bud- 



dagh, and in Ullsvfater Lake in Cumberland. Dr. 

 Heysham records it in his catalogue of Cumberlanci 

 animals, and observes that some specimens have 

 been found to weigh between fifty and sixty pounds. 



It is probably the trout mentioned by the Rev. 

 Mr. Lowe, in his ' Fauna Orcadeujis,' as occurring 

 in the Orkneys and Shetlands, and weighing thirty- 

 six pounds and upwards. We have seen specimens, 

 from Lough Neagh thirty-five inches long; they 

 were exhibited at the Zool. Soc, .June 9, 1835, by 

 Mr. Thompson, and are alluded to by Mr. Yarrell. ' 



This species roves about indiscriminately, and feed* 

 almost entirely upon the smaller fish. By persons re- 

 siding on the banks of the lakes which they inhabit, 

 numbers are often taken by night-lines, " few rising^ 

 at the artificial fly, but they may be always takei> 

 by strong trolling tackle baited with a small trout ;. 

 they are extremely voracious, and having seized the^ 

 bait, will allow themselves to be dragged by the- 

 teeth for forty or fifty yards, and wlien accidentally 

 freed, will immediately again seize it." Young fisl» 

 will rise freely at the ily. This species seldom ven- 

 tures either up or down any of the streams con- 

 nected with the lakes ; it spawns in September. 



2451.— The Smelt 



(Osmenis esper/amts). Sparling and Spirling, Pro- 

 vincial. 



In the genus Osmerus the body is elongated and 

 covered with small scales; there are two dorsal 

 fins ; the first with rays, the second fleshy without 

 rays. The ventral fins are placed in a vertical line- 

 under the common cement of the dorsal fin; teetli 

 on the jaws, and tongue long and sharp ; two drs- 

 tinct rows on each palatal bone, none on the vomer, 

 Branchiostegous rays eight. 



The true smelt seems to be confined as a Britishi 

 fish to the eastern and western coasts of our island ; 

 its place along the southern coast being occupied 

 by the Atherine, or Sand-smelt (Atherina Presbyteiv 

 Cuv.), which is very plentiful, of excellent quality, 

 and with a slight odour of cucumbers ; it is one of 

 the Mugilidae (Acantliopterygii). 



Like the salmon, the smelt visits the rivers, which 

 it inhabits from August to May ; it spawns in March 

 or April, after which the shoals return to the sea. 

 In the month of August, the young fry may be seen 

 in the mouths of rivers, swimming near the surface, 

 ascending and descending with the tide ;. at this pe- 

 riod the adults are making their way up the river. 

 Formerly these fish abounded at the proper season 

 in the Thames from Wandsworth to Hammersmith, 

 but at present, owing to the state of the water, none 

 advance so high as London. The Medway p-oduces 

 smelts of excellent quality. The peculiar odour pf 

 this fish, resembling that of a cucumber, is well 

 known ; it is very powerful when the fish is just 

 taken from the water, but a few days' exposure to 

 the air greatly diminishes or even destroys it, and 

 the delicate flavour of the flesh is lost. During the 

 present season, 1844, smelts have been very abund- 

 ant in the London market. 



Experiments seem to prove that the smelt will not 

 only live, but thrive and multiply in the fresh water 

 of ponds or lakes. Colonel Meynel, of Yarm in. 

 Yorkshire, introduced smelts into a Iresh-water pond 

 of about tluee acres, having no communication with, 

 the sea ; here they remained for four years.and great ly 

 multiplied ; they were not atfecteu by the freezing, 

 over of the pond, though the ice was sufficiently 

 strong to admit of skating ; and when at last the 

 pond was drawn, they proved to be equal in size and 

 flavour to the finest which had enjoyed their natu- 

 ral range. 



The smelt is a voracious lilt le fish ; it devours young. . 

 fry, and small Crustacea, as shrimps and mollusks. 

 In the Thames and Medway this fish is taken by 

 means of small meshed nets, from the 28th of Au- 

 gust till Good-Friday. Along the eastern coast, and-, 

 especially Lincolnshire, numbers are taken in shal- 

 low bays. They occur in the Swale in Essex. 



The smelt as seen in the shops is seldom above 

 six or seven inches in length; occasionally speci- 

 mens of ten or eleven inches occur ; and Pennaiit 

 mentions one which measured thirteen inches long,. 

 and weighed eight ounces. 



The back of the smelt is of a pale greyish green 

 passing on the sides into silvery while, which is- 

 the colour of the gill-covers and under parts. 



Figs. 24.")2 to 2460 : — Various species of caddis- 

 worms, the larvie, Phryganese, enclosed in cases,, 

 some composed ol leaves, some of little jiebbles ami 

 shells, some of straws, some of grains of sand aggiu ■ 

 tinated together. These caddis worms are the lii- 

 vourite food of many of the freshwater ^i^hes, and 

 are killing baits. 



Belore concluding our outline of the Salmonida, 

 we may observe that, as respects the genus Salmo 

 great difiiculty exists in discriminating beiweeii 

 many of the species, especially when young. 



The Parr or Samlet has been and still is in some 

 places regarded as the young of ihe salmon. Mr.. 

 Yarrell says, " The fry of the diftereut species ot 



