SALMON. 



'597 



of judging at what season the trout shall be in finest 

 flesh. We speak, of course, chiefly of those smaller 

 streams which are a good deal influenced by their 

 immediate banks ; for a large river brings more 

 power of character along with it, and of course it is 

 less affected by local causes. But, in streams of 

 moderate dimension?, the presence of minnows in 

 large numbers is always a sign that there are few or 

 no trout to be got there. Minnows shoal only where 

 the banks are shelving and the water shallow ; and 

 such places do not suit trout. Worms, too, only 

 come partially into the streams, and those that do 

 come are in great part from wet ground, and trout 

 will not readily take them as bait. Trout never 

 have their finest colour, or are properly filled up in 

 proportion to their length, if there are not overhang- 

 ing banks of kindly soil, covered with wholesome 

 herbage. 



There are perhaps more anecdotes of trout and 

 trout-fishing than there are of salmon ; and as a very 

 large trout is a much greater rarity than a very large 

 salmon, it is accounted a greater rarity. If delicacy 

 of food is the object, the small ones, which have the 

 flesh pure white, are preferable to any others ; but 

 in this case, as well as in other cases, greatness is, 

 on account of its rarity, probably preferred to good- 

 ness. There is one large trout, of which we shall 

 quote the notice from Mr. Yarrell, which seems to 

 have been one of the Anakim of the species. " A 

 few years since," says he, " a notice was sent to the 

 Linnaean Society of a trout that was caught on the 

 llth of January, 1822, in a little stream, ten feet 

 wide, branching from the Avon, at the back of 

 Castle Street, Salisbury. On being taken out of the 

 water, its weight was found to be twenty-five pounds. 

 Mrs. Powell, at the bottom of whose garden the fish 

 was first discovered, placed it in a pond, where it fed 

 and lived four months, but had decreased in weight, 

 at the time of its death, to twenty-one pounds and a 

 quarter." We have heard of very strange notices 

 and noticeable things being sent to learned societies, 

 and, among the rest, of a portion of the blade-bone of a 

 sheep, which had been blackened in the earth, sent 

 and received as "ditto" of the blade of an elk's 

 horn ; but we are far from supposing that there was 

 any hoax in this great Salisburian trout. The 

 close of 1821 was remarkable for its floods enough 

 to make the monarch of all the trouts mistake a rill 

 for a river ; and it is for this reason chiefly that we 

 have noticed the fact of this one. There is no doubt 

 that early winters, or late autumns, according to the 

 climate, which are remarkable for rain-storms and 

 floods, arc equally remarkable for the migrations of 

 some of the Salmonidce. This is a curious point in 

 the natural history of fresh-water fishes, and one 

 which has not hitherto received the attention which 

 it seems to be worthy of. 



Among the supposed varieties, or even species, of 

 the common trout, there is one which we cannot 

 wholly pass over in silence, and that is^the Gilaroo, 

 or gizzard trout, which is met with chiefly in Ireland. 

 The stomachs of the Salmonidce are all, in their 

 natural state, membranous, but these are understood 

 to get into places where they swallow Crustacea, and 

 more especially mollusca, the crusts and shells of 

 which are too much for a membranous stomach, and 

 so the trout get a sort of gizzard to help them through 

 with this more severe labour. In the specimens of 

 Gilaroo trout, examined by Mr. Yarrell with his 



usual accuracy, there was found to be no increase of 

 the muscular substance or power of the stomach, 

 though the inner coat of that organ was indurated. 

 It was found to contain in the stomach shelled 

 mollusca, chiefly the Cyclostomum impervium of 

 Draparnaud, a small whorled shell, which is very 

 abundant on the shallow bottoms of many lakes. 

 That the stomachs of these trout should undergo 

 the change which has been observed, is one of the 

 most remarkable instances of the dependence of the 

 minor characters of trout upon the nature of their 

 food. It is in Ireland chiefly that the variety of 

 trout, having the hardened coat to the stomach, 

 have been found, chiefly in lakes, or in the outlets 

 between those lakes and the sea. 



It seems, too, that there is a great tendency in 

 trout to perpetuate, in the successive generations, the 

 accidental changes which are impressed upon them, 

 even though these are mere definities. It is said 

 that many of the trout, in some of the rivers of South 

 Wales, have the spine crooked a little in advance of 

 the origin of the tail. In some parts of the High- 

 lands of Scotland they exhibit other deformities ; 

 as, for instance, there are some in Lochaber, the 

 black lakes, near Pitmain, in the valley of the Spey, 

 which have the lower jaw of the same length as 

 usual, but the upper one truncated and rounded, so 

 that it is hardly the diameter of that organ in 

 advance of the eye. The cause of this, or the kind 

 of food on which these trout chiefly subsist, are not 

 known ; so prone, indeed, are the trout to change 

 their appearance from what appear to us very slight 

 causes, and often in cases where we can see no cause 

 at all, that the natural history of them is an extensive 

 subject, and one to which justice cannot be done in a 

 work intended for the use of the public generally. 



Trout are as delicate in their nature as they are 

 susceptible of changes of appearance from natural 

 causes. We have already remarked how they are 

 affected, both in their colours and in the quality of 

 their flesh, by the admixture of the water of peat 

 bogs, which contains only a vegetable admixture ; 

 and they are still more affected by anything of a 

 mineral nature. The common trout cannot be 

 brought to bear salt water, or even water which is 

 very perceptibly brackish ; but whether the gills or 

 the skin suffer the most in such cases is not known. 

 It is probable that the skin suffers considerably, for 

 all the marine Salmonidce have a different cuticular 

 appearance from the fresh-water ones ; and the same 

 may be said generally of most of the fish which range 

 freely through these waters. In farther proof of this, 

 it may be mentioned, that the migrant Salmonidcs 

 lose their sea lustre after they have been for some 

 time in the fresh waters. Any mineral impregnation 

 is equally unfavourable to trout. The drainage of a 

 mine is sufficient to destroy those of a considerable 

 stream ; a few lumps of quicklime thrown into a pool 

 will soon kill all the trout ; and they disappear from 

 the brooks among the corn-fields when these are 

 highly dressed with lime. Nothing is more speedily 

 fatal to them than the water in which flax is 

 macerated, in order that the epidermis may be rotted, 

 and the fibres come easily from each other. In short, 

 there is hardly one product of soil which can get 

 into the waters which is not deleterious to these 

 highly sensitive fishes. 



GUEY LAKE TROUT (S. lacustris). This is a large 

 species, of sequestered habits, residing only in those 



