18 THE NATURAL HISTORY AND HABITS 



of nature, salmon would begin spawning early in 

 September : I don't mean to say that all the fish 

 would begin at that time, for many of them have not 

 left the sea at the time others are on the beds, but 

 the first part of them would begin at that time. The 

 first that are seen at operations are generally a few 

 grilses that have escaped the snares and traps of the 

 fisherman, and always near the tops or uppermost 

 fords of the rivers ; and for a few days previous to 

 their going on to the shallows, they are seen in the 

 stream immediately below that shallow, and at that 

 time the lure of the angler always proves deadly. 

 The fish, being then in a poor and hungry state, will 

 catch at any thing in the shape of food ; and there 

 the un gentlemanly sportsman, and the poacher, exer- 

 cises the unmanly game, as he thinks successfully, 

 by taking out fish actually at the spawning. These 

 first fish are soon accompanied by more, which num- 

 bers increase, by one shoal succeeding another, and 

 by all the fords and shallows farther down the river 

 being occupied, up to the 1st of December. From 

 the 1 st of December, on to the middle of March, the 

 numbers are seen decreasing on the fords, in about 

 the same proportion as they are seen increasing from 

 the middle of September to the 1st of December. 

 The greatest throng of the operations always take 

 place from the middle of November to the middle of 

 December. The fish always approach the spawning 

 beds in pairs ; one male and one female go together 

 and occupy the same bed ; but they differ a little 

 from some other parts of creation, for, in this case, 

 the female has the honour of selecting the male (I 

 suppose to her own taste), and if the male should 

 chance to be destroyed as is often the case by 

 poachers (for the male seems not so timid as the fe- 

 male, and stands the approach of the torch better), 



