PREFACE. 



he kept them confined in a stream of running 

 water, -and by the month of May the whole of 

 them had become smoults ; but some had leaped 

 out of their confinement, in their struggle to find 

 their way to the sea, and were found dead upon 

 the side of the pond. This having convinced him 

 that what was called parr in salmon rivers, was, 

 in fact, the young salmon ere it became a smoult, 

 he entered with much earnestness into the arti- 

 ficial propagation scheme when it was started at 

 Stormontfield, and was present and assisted at 

 most of the manipulations. 



The author would here record his best thanks 

 to Robert Buist, Esq., superintendent of the Tay 

 Fisheries (to whom belongs the merit of carrying 

 on the experiment, for it required no small amount 

 of intelligence and perseverance to unravel the 

 seeming discrepancies of Shaw and Young in the 

 natural history of the salmon up to the period of 

 the smoult state), for the assistance which he has 

 given the writer, while watching and taking part 

 in the various experiments as they progressed. 

 He would also acknowledge the services rendered 



