AND ANGLING SONGS. 347 



When in Sutherlandshire in 1850, on the margins of Loch Slam, 

 which subtends or forms a continuation with Loch Loyal, places 

 similar ip their general character were pointed out to me, over 

 which the charr were known to congregate in immense numbers. 

 On Loch Leven, in Kinross- shire, also, where this fish (Salmo 

 alpinus) is now understood to have become extinct, the spawning- 

 grounds possessed the same conformation. 



The sudden disappearance of the charr from Loch Leven has 

 been attributed to the partial drainage, to which, nearly fifty 

 years ago, its waters were subjected a surface of 4638 acres 

 having been reduced to 3543 acres, and the depth, which pre- 

 viously averaged 18 J feet, suffering in proportion. By this 

 reduction, the spawning-grounds of the charr must have been 

 seriously curtailed ; but I was told, when at Kinross in 1857, that 

 the total disappearance of the fish in question from that quarter 

 had been occasioned by a successful attack made by poachers 

 with the long-net upon the entire stock or body, when in occu- 

 pancy of the shoal over which their breeding-ground operations 

 were wont to be conducted. There is no doubt, at least, that in 

 common with those of Loch Achilty and Loch Loyal, the spawn- 

 ing resorts of the charr on Loch Leven consisted of a stretch of 

 shallow water, sandy and level at bottom, which gave great faci- 

 lities for the accomplishment of an act of outrage on the whole- 

 sale scale, such as I was informed, on excellent authority, had 

 been committed. The preference shown by the Windermere 

 charr to a rocky bottom is, in face of those facts, not easily ex- 

 plained. I suspect, however, there has been a standing, or tradi- 

 tional assumption, not actual proof or determination, upon that 

 point. In this suspicion I find I am borne out largely by Dr. 

 Davy, F.R.S., brother of the late Sir Humphry, in The Angler 

 and his Friend, an interesting volume published eight or nine 

 years ago. Residing, as Dr. Davy has done, at Ambleside, 

 for a long period, during which subjects of natural history, and 



