150 ABSTRACT OF EVIDENCE 



ova in March ; young salmon do not go far into 

 the sea from the rivers, for in August and Sep- 

 tember, fish, exactly resembling them in form, and 

 from ten to fourteen inches long (called whitings or 

 whitelings*), without visible ova or spermatic secre- 

 tion, are found in salmon rivers a mile or two from 



NOTES. 



fish to increase in number and size six months or upwards. 

 The roe in the peal must be the same, and therefore not 

 fit to spawn for many months after it is seen in July and 

 August. 



* This is the salmon peal to be sure, or young salmon ; 

 but Sir H. D. is mistaken in saying that they have no visible 

 ova. 1 have seen a great many this summer taken in 

 the Dart, with a visible though embryo roe, and calcu- 

 lated only to be shed at a very distant time. The fish are 

 taken twelve or fourteen miles from the sea in the Dart, and 

 would go further up if the weirs and fish-locks would allow 

 them. 



Here Sir H. D. says, the salmon and the gilse are the 

 same fish. 



I can say nothing about Scotch law ; but I understand 

 and believe that in England those cruives, answering to 

 our fish-locks, are altogether illegal. Three different sorts 

 of this contrivance I have seen, and there are" a great many 

 that I have heard described which I have not seen. The 

 public may depend upon it that there are few greater im- 

 provements to be made upon the fisheries, than a power 

 of keeping all salmon from artificial cuts of water into the 

 natural stream. 



Sir Humphry Davy says, that the close time should be 

 enlarged generally ; but if a man of his scientific celebrity 

 had specified the time when the rivers shoujd open and 



