BRITAINS BEYOND THE SEAS 265 



or, as the Newfoundlanders call it, ' a pond ' at the 

 head of the river, in which the fish spawn. 



" There is no doubt that the salmon are increasing 

 in size and in numbers in the rivers best looked after ; 

 but in the more remote ones poaching is still the 

 order of the day. 



" The salmon arrives off the coast along with the 

 capling, a fish about the size of our sprat. The 

 fishermen tell me they have often found capling in 

 the stomach of the salmon caught in the nets. The 

 capling, I may mention, is the bait all the Newfound- 

 land cod fishermen use. The arrival of the capling 

 and ipso facto of the salmon is governed by the 

 earliness or the lateness of spring. The spring of 

 1905 was one of the latest on record, and I find on re- 

 ferring to my Diary, that although we were catching 

 odd fresh fish in the Codroy from June 7, and many 

 mended kelts salmon that have spawned late and 

 been in salt water only six weeks or so the main 

 run of fish did not begin until June 20. In 1904 

 the fish ran in the same river the first week in June ; 

 in 1903 they arrived on June 10. The Codroy is 

 looked on as the earliest river in Newfoundland. 



"My own opinion is that the salmon in New- 

 foundland would greatly benefit by the Government 

 leasing rivers to private persons under the conditions 

 on which the Canadian rivers are leased. 



"Of salmon on the Pacific Coast we find six 

 varieties the King or Spring Salmon, the Cohoe, the 

 Steelhead, the Humpback, the Dog Salmon, and the 

 Sockeye. Only the first three will take a lure, and I 



