374 RIVERS OF THE MORAY FIRTH. 



It is a circumstance worth mentioning connected 

 with the salmon-fishings on Spey, that in order to give 

 protection to the spawn against the attacks of the 

 water-ouzel, it was formerly the custom to reward any 

 person who during the season had killed one of these 

 birds, by giving him permission to fish salmon with the 

 rod during close-time. This clause, however, is not 

 embodied in any modern enactment relative to salmon- 

 fishings, nor is it at all likely to be introduced in time to 

 come. Still, there is no question that the havoc occa- 

 sioned among the spawning beds, by means of the ouzel 

 or water-crow on most of our rivers in the present day, 

 exceeds all the damage that could possibly be achieved 

 by rod-fishers, whose lures and artifices few fish intent 

 on breeding ever regard. I have often seen, on a single 

 stream in Tweed, three or four of these little birds, 

 busily employed filling their paunches with unhatched 

 ova. On these occasions, they appear to act in concert 

 proceeding regularly, pair by pair, up the shallow 

 water. They remain under the surface, generally about 

 half a minute, sometimes longer; every dive, on the 

 bird again emerging, is succeeded by a short flight, and 

 on betaking itself once more to the bed of the stream, 

 it does so with a considerable degree of violence. 

 While below water, it walks with apparent ease, and 

 makes the most of its time. The water-ouzel has a 

 fine melodious voice, and on Tweedside pours forth its 

 lay earlier than any other of our feathered songsters. 



To revert to the Spey ; it is considered to be the 

 most rapid of our first-class rivers. Its general velocity 

 has been estimated at four-and-a-half miles per hour. 

 At the mouth, and along that portion of it where the 

 salmon-fishings are principally conducted, it is liable on 

 the occasion of a flood to shift its channel; consequently, 



