FOOD OF THE SEA-TROUT. 179 



While engaged with fruitless endeavours to accom- 

 plish my object, the peculiar surface-kissing mode in 

 which the sea- trout continued rising within cast, inciting 

 me to persevere, I was approached by the tacksman's 

 overseer and his assistants, who with a small boat carry- 

 ing their nets, had sallied out, for the purpose of taking 

 a haul or two before the tide commenced ebbing, when, 

 as might be expected, the fish would retire back to a 

 greater distance from the water's edge and beyond reach 

 of danger. Although I generally take considerable in- 

 terest in seeing a net shot, when the haul is likely to prove 

 successful ; on the present occasion, this interest was not 

 a little heightened by a certain degree of curiosity, with 

 respect to the cause of those belling and busy motions I 

 had observed on the surface, and which, from their dis- 

 similarity to the natural risings of sea-trout, when in 

 salt water, I mentally attributed to the circumstance of 

 their being on the feed ; although, as to the kind and 

 character of the food itself, I abstained, at the moment, 

 from forming any conjectures. 



Upon this point, however, the first draught of the 

 net afforded me ample satisfaction. It consisted of 

 about thirty sea-trout of the white and grey kinds, 

 averaging from a pound and a half to three pounds 

 each. These, or a great number of them, immediately 

 on being hauled to shore, disgorged from their maws 

 individuals of the herring tribe, measuring about an 

 inch and a half in length. In one or two cases, the 

 trout seemed literally crammed with this sort of food. 

 I took five or six specimens out of the mouth of a 

 single fish. So far, for the first haul of the net or 

 seine. The next, which was more judiciously effected, 

 discovered no less than seventy or eighty sea-trout, 

 among which lay enthralled a prime and beautiful 



