VI 

 SEA-TROUT FISHING 



WHEN the successful angler surveys a four- or five-pound 

 sea-trout dripping fresh from the tidal waters of some 

 Canadian river, as he notes the fine proportions and pure colours 

 of the fish, the graceful form of the round broad back curving 

 to the small well-shaped head, the flashing lights thrown back from 

 the brilliant silvery sides, the opal tints of the lower parts of the 

 body, and the delicate carmine of the stiffening fins, he finds it 

 difficult to believe that the sea-trout is not entitled to a name of 

 its own, for all the protestations of the naturalists that it is nothing 

 more or less than the ordinary river trout, otherwise Salvelinus 

 fontinalis, which has ' suffered a sea change into something rare 

 and strange,' by a habit that has gradually been acquired of running 

 to the ocean, where the bountiful diet of the sea has brought about 

 a remarkable development in size and beauty. Anatomically 

 considered there can be no structural difference whatsoever dis- 

 covered between the two, sharply contrasted as they are to all 

 outward appearance. 



The naturalist has also settled it that there is no specific differ- 

 ence between the gamy ouananiche (pronounced wonaneesh a fish 

 in appearance very similar to the well-known Loch Leven trout), 

 which haunts the inland Canadian waters, and the Atlantic salmon. 

 The opinion was for a long time held that this interesting fish w r as 

 a ' land-locked ' salmon, by some means having formerly become 

 imprisoned by natural barriers in remote upper waters, and debarred 

 for a long period of time from access to the sea. Further investiga- 

 tion, however, has shown that the ouananiche cannot possibly 

 be considered a land-locked salmon, for wherever found it can 

 run to sea if it has the desire. Hence we are brought face to face 

 with the remarkable conclusion that two varieties of the finny 

 tribe by which the vast network of Canadian lakes and her thousands 

 of clear rapid rivers are tenanted have this marked peculiarity in 

 common, that a certain proportion of individuals have developed 

 the habit of running to the ocean, while others of less enterprise, 

 remaining all their lives in the fresh -water pools and rapids, are 



