160 FISHING WITH THE SALMON ROE. 



vinced, among the finny tribe, an enemy to the ova 

 and incipient spawn of salmon more rapacious and 

 destructive than this very fish ; nor is it one, as is 

 well known, remunerative as a marketable article to 

 the tacksman or proprietor of fishings. It is seldom 

 taken from our rivers in good and edible condition, 

 ascending them in large quantities only during close- ' 

 time ; and at the commencement of the open season, 

 continuing to haunt them, in the shape of a hungry 

 and good-for-nothing kelt; thus, not only tampering 

 with and preying upon the undeveloped deposit, but 

 committing unmeasured havoc among the infant fry. 



But while thus palliating the use of the roe as an 

 angling bait, on rivers frequented by salmon, I would 

 strictly set face against its employment on purely 

 trouting waters. Upon these, if of small width, the 

 injury it is possible to inflict with it might, for a season 

 at least, prove very serious. Let me suppose, for 

 instance, that it is brought into play, under favourable 

 circumstances, on the Eden or Blackater, two highly 

 reputed streams in Berwickshire. I believe it prac- 

 ticable for one well versed in the use of it to strip, 

 in the course of a few hours, to the extent of half-a- 

 mile, either water mentioned, of three-fourths of the 

 primest fish inhabiting it ; and were he to pursue this 

 system of devastation throughout, he would, in the 

 course of a short time, nearly depopulate the whole range 

 of pools, leaving only the pricked fish and a few dozen of 

 stragglers to replenish them. Such extreme butchery 

 would, of course, not only be condemned as unsports- 

 man-like, but as an outrage upon common sense and 

 feeling, whereas the destruction of a few hundreds of 

 mischievous fish, in a broad and plentifully stocked 

 river, not only effects little injury to the trouting, 



