SIZE OF SALMON. 65 



with, and that a river may be stocked with any sort of 

 common fish by transmitting the ova and milt amalga- 

 mated, embedded in gravel, and placed in a vessel filled 

 up with water. One of our best fish, namely Trout,cannot 

 be sent alive even to a moderate distance. It is worth 

 while, therefore, to try the experiment. According to a 

 letter published by the late Sir Anthony Carlisle, some- 

 thing nearly approaching to this was done by him in 

 the river Wandle about thirty years ago. He then im- 

 bedded the ova of the Salmon in the gravel without the 

 milt of the male, leaving the River Trout to impregnate 

 them : he asserts that they did so, and that the river 

 was afterwards full of the fry so produced. It would 

 be interesting to put the Salmon eggs properly impreg- 

 nated with the milt of the same species in one of our best 

 streams, — in the upper parts of the Test, for instance, 

 — and to investigate the result from year to year. 



Salmon keep on increasing in size until they attain a 

 prodigious weight, even up to eighty-three pounds ; 

 which, says Mr. Yarrell, is the largest fish on record, 

 and was exhibited at Mr. Grove's, fishmonger, in Bond 

 Street, about the season of 1821. This was a female 

 fish ; and, from the observation of the same eminent 

 authority, those fish which attain a very unusual size 

 have always proved to be females. 



But the devices and intelligence of fishermen have 

 increased as Salmon have become more marketable, so 

 that few escape all the perils that beset them long 

 enough to gain any considerable size ; and we no more 

 hear, as in days of yore, of a fish being exchanged, 

 weight for weight, for a Highland wedder, and the 



