62 SPORT ON THE SALMON RIVERS 



the Lahave, Medway, Liverpool, the Clyde, the Shelburne, and 

 the Tusket, each of which has glorious salmon pools, and once 

 fairly swarmed with sea-trout, salmon, and the useful gaspereaux 

 in appearance something like the herring, a member of the Clupeidae 

 (Alosa tyrannus) . The catch of this latter fish alone in 1870 amounted 

 to 50,000 barrels a year in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, where 

 they formed a welcome addition to the means of the farmers settled 

 along the river banks. 



The same may be said of Salmon River, the Musquodoboit, 

 the Tangier, and the St. Mary's to the eastward of Halifax. The 

 beautiful Annapolis, a slow full river, flowing through long fertile 

 meadows and luxuriant apple orchards, has of late vastly improved, 

 and offers many tempting pools to which the fish have a free course 

 from the Bay of Fundy. Although in each of these rivers (named 

 in the order of their distance from the capital city) the fishing is 

 free and open, each season tempts a bare score of salmon anglers 

 to their banks. A couple of fish a day seems to be the maximum 

 of an angler's hopes, and it must be confessed that on many a 

 good fishing day he draws a blank. 



Turning to New Brunswick, there the conditions are widely 

 different. Her numerous charming streams, of far greater volume 

 than those of the sister province, perhaps ranking among the noblest 

 salmon rivers of the world, are all leased, and the privileges of the 

 rod, with few exceptions, are only obtainable by purchase or favour. 

 Every year some streams, or sections of streams, are offered at 

 public auction in the town of Fredericton, and prices are often ridi- 

 culously cheap compared with those obtained for far inferior water 

 in Norway. The Restigouche ranks high in merit in comparison 

 with any salmon stream in civilized territory. 



The Miramichi, not one river, but several, draining an immense 

 tract of wilderness, is divided into two main branches, the North- 

 west and the South-west. The Metapedia is a fine ample river, 

 but has failed of late for causes not determined. 



Flowing into the romantic Bay of Chaleur, in the Quebec district 

 of Gaspe, are several rivers commanding high prices, noted for 

 the large size of the salmon which they hold. The most famous of 

 these are the Grand Cascapedia, the Little Cascapedia, the Bona- 

 venture and the York, which flows into the charming Gaspe Basin. 

 In a beautiful grove, on the Grand Cascapedia, a few miles from the 

 mouth where a mountain torrent storms into the river, nailed against 

 the wall of the fishing camp, is an effigy cut in birch bark of a salmon 

 which weighed fifty-four pounds, killed by Lord Stanley. 



The season for all these rivers is from the loth or i5th of June 

 up to the ist of August. 



