AND ANGLING SONGS. 273 



until it came to where the river was free of ice, and ran with con- 

 siderable rapidity in the shape of a narrow lade or race, on the 

 other side of which the foot-prints of the animals re-appeared, 

 and took their course towards a small island, or Ana, as it is 

 locally called, situated above the junction of the Teviot with 

 Tweed. Above the island, and accessory, no doubt, to its ori- 

 ginal formation, stands the cauld-dyke, built for the purpose of 

 directing a sufficiency of water-power towards Kelso corn-mill. 

 Below this barrier, on the south side of the river, where the slap 

 lies, a great number of salmon were collected that winter, and 

 had commenced spawning. These fish, many of which had been 

 exhausted by fruitless efforts to reach higher ground, formed an 

 object, no doubt, of attraction to the otters. On three successive 

 mornings a salmon was discovered on an exposed part of the 

 Ana, killed, and partly devoured by the pair in question. The 

 severe frost having deprived them of all access to their usual 

 food, they had evidently been pressed by hunger to commit this 

 series of ravages. 



A singular fact in connexion with this circumstance is, that 

 although a large proportion of the fish assembled below the cauld- 

 slap were at that time on the spawning- beds, and might have 

 been approached and pounced upon with great ease, the salmon 

 selected by the otters were all well-conditioned, such as, judging 

 from their appearance, it would give some trouble to hunt down 

 and secure. The paired breeders evidently were not thought 

 palatable, and had been left unmolested ; at any rate, they had 

 not been scared away from the stream, for, during the days which 

 followed these repasts, they were observed at work on the redds 

 as unconcerned and apparently as numerous as ever, close to the 

 spot where their less fortunate associates had been victimized. 

 The fact that only one fish was discovered next morning, as the 

 result of the previous night's foray, where there was opportunity 

 for a wholesale massacre, goes to prove that the instincts of the 



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