214 FOREST LIFE IN ACADIE. 



golden light; and the gradations of the dark green })ackji 

 with its fantastic labyrinthine markings, to the sofi 

 yellow beneath, are marked by a central roseate tinge^ 

 inclining to lavender or pale mauve. 



This species abounds throughout the Northern States 

 and British provinces, showing a great variety as to 

 form and colour (both external and of the flesh) accord- 

 ing to locality. In the swampy bog-hole the trout is 

 black ; his flesh of a pale yellowish-white, flabby and 

 insipid. In low-lying forest lakes margined by swamp, 

 where from a rank soft bottom the water-lilies crop 

 up and almost conceal the surface near the shores, he 

 is the same coarse and spiritless fish. Worthless for 

 the camp frying-pan, we leave him to the tender mercies 

 of the mink, the eel, and the leech. The bright, bold 

 trout of the large lakes, is a far different fish. His com- 

 paratively small and well-shaped head, followed by an 

 arched, thick shoulder, depth of body, and brilliant 

 colouring ; the spirited dash with which he seizes his prey, 

 and, finally, the bright salmon-pink hue of his delicate 

 flesh, make him an object of attraction to both sportsman 

 and epicure. Such fish we find in the clearest water, 

 where the shores of the lake are fringed with granite 

 boulders, with beaches of white sand, or disintegrated 

 granite, where the rush and the water- weeds are only 

 seen in little sheltered coves, where the face of the lake 

 is dotted with rocky, bush-covered islands, and where 

 there are great, cool depths to which he can retreat 

 when sickened by the heat of the surface-water at mid- 

 summer. 



Though more a lacustrine than a river fish, seldom 

 attaining any size if confined to running water between 



