DAYS STOLEN FOR SPORT 159 



may know a salmon from a kelt ? The signs are every- 

 where on every kelt, yet I cannot find the man who 

 can give me one by which I may know a fairly -mended 

 silver kelt. It's just a problem that must be demon- 

 strated by laying the two side by side, and then the 

 difference will be so striking as to afford an education 

 that you cannot possibl}^ forget, and, for ever after, 

 a kelt, hke wTiting that has become famihar, is unmis- 

 takable in every line. Kelts are bogies that have 

 frightened fishers into returning many a clean fish. 



One of the cleverest Tay salmon fishers I have 

 met caught two fish in the Tummel, thought them 

 clean until too late to return them to the water, and, 

 liking them less and less after their death, buried them 

 under some bracken, and told me during dinner 

 what he had done, adding : *I feel sure they are 

 kelts.' I felt sure they were not, or he would have 

 recognised them. Tummel salmon are long and thin 

 and much inclined to favour such mistakes, but the 

 fish in question were unusually well-shaped and the 

 fisher of such repute as to seem bej^ond the reach of 

 kelt-fright. 



It happened quite recently that a Captain's gillie, 

 following closely upon the Captain's heels, brought 

 to the hotel a silver kelt, and so unmistakable to me 

 was the character of the animal that I whispered to 

 the host while yet the fish and fisher were some 

 distance from the lobby. The giUie is a shepherd 

 and knows nothing of the fishing; the Captain is 

 the dearest of good fellows and a happy fisher, catch 

 fish who may; so you can be sure the news of his mis- 

 take was broken to him gently. The host referred 

 him to me to ask for some distinguishing mark by 

 which he might know a kelt, so he came to me and 

 said : 'Would you mind telling me how I may know 

 whether a fish is a salmon or a kelt?' 



I told him of many signs that would stamp a fish 

 a kelt, but that the first one he caught might have 



