44 



AMERICAN FISHES. 



Whether there exists a Salmon Trout or Silver Trout, Salmo Trutta 

 Marina, at all in American waters, apart from the Salmon-peal, Grilse 

 and common Trout, having access to salt-water, likewise remains to 

 be proved, by the aid of those easy methods of examination, the use of 

 which I so earnestly desire to impress upon my friends and fellow- 

 sportsmen, not merely as an aid to science, but as an immense addition 

 to their own individual gratification, when in pursuit of their finny 

 prey by the wild margin of some far woodland lake, or on the rocky 

 borders of some lone torrent of the wilderness. 



That many new species, entirely unsuspected and undescibed, still 

 remain to be found and recorded in our waters, I hold to be undoubted ; 

 when they will be discovered, or by whom, is another question ; for I 

 regret to say it, as yet the spirit of science, and the desire to facili- 

 tate and assist the inquiries of the man of letters, has scarcely pene- 

 trated the breast of the American sportsman ; and while, in England 

 and on the European Continent, many the most distinguished corres- 

 pondents of the literary and scientific institutions of those lands are 

 sportsmen, who have contributed most highly to the advancement of 

 knowledge by their investigations, experiments and contributions, we 

 can, on this side, alas ! point to but two or three of the sporting frater- 

 nity who have cared to record themselves as anything more than killers 

 of animals ; of the habits, characteristics, and even names of which 

 they are but too often grossly ignorant. 



A few there are, it is true, who aspire to higher things, and who 

 are actuated by something more than the mere love of killing, the 

 mere ambition of boasting of bag; and among these, may their num- 

 ber increase daily! it will not, I hope, be deemed impertinent to 

 specify the author of " The Birds of Long Island," who, from a sports- 

 man of no secondary skill or energy, has successfully aspired to the 

 honors of a naturalist ; and has most deservedly acquired, as such, no 

 small degree of celebrity and favor. 



From this short excursion, into which I have been naturally led 

 in the course of my subject, I return to the description of the gill- 

 covers of fish, and thereafter to the dental system, the method of com- 

 paring which I shall lay down briefly for the use of the learner, and 

 then proceed at once to the history of sporting-fishes. 



