228 FACT AGAINST FICTION. 



to speak; and, incleed, I know notliing ; for if the 

 sea trout is a genus per se, I do not know where it 

 breeds^ and in the English rivers, far from the tidal 

 way, and at times when salmon and trout breed, 

 I have never met with it. 



The sea trout (so called) — the larger sea trout 

 that I have seen (there is a very fine one, very well 

 preserved in a glass-case in the shop of Henry 

 Cutler, the excellent fishmonger and gallant man, 

 for he has saved human life at sea, at Bournemouth) 

 — is precisely, in size and weight, like a salmon 

 not yet arrived at his silvery jpc^yec^zo;?. On my 

 telling Cutler that it looked very like a salmon, 

 he said that it did, but the proof that it was a 

 sea trout lay in the ajDplication of the thumb 

 or finger nail the reverse way of the scales. Those 

 of t\\Q sea trout would easily come off, while the 

 salmon scales were more close and adhesive* Still, 

 this might arise/rp^?i condition^ and not from variety 

 of class* 



I confess I thirst for knowledge of the exact and 

 natural history of what is called the sea trout, 

 because I need a l^etter reference to distinguish 

 species by than a loose scale, as in the snig and 

 eel, a blunter or a sliarper nose, and a variety 



