THE SALMON'S JOURNEY 387 



the passion of movement from one home to another. Nor 

 in any other animal can you see more distinctly the joy and 

 zest with which the return is associated. If one may use 

 such words, the movement is passionate and exultant. 

 Perhaps no one who has repeatedly watched salmon entering 

 a river will quarrel with such words. 



There is a salmon river on the west coast of Ireland 

 which is peculiarly 'early,' and rivers differ much more than 

 land in the qualities which both fishermen and farmers call 

 early and late. The waters which are neither very broad 



A SALMON RIVER 



nor deep tumble into the sea over a great stretch of loose 

 shingle where they lose their depth, even in spate and at 

 high tide. If you watch well this space between river and 

 shore on a favourable day in a favourable season you may 

 see, even as early as January, the pioneers of the salmon 

 migrants rolling and scrambling and scraping their scales 

 over the shingle. They looked as if they exulted in the 

 struggle, as if it were a sort of obstacle race for a great prize. 

 When the migration is at its height you may see scores of 

 fish, appearing and disappearing from the shallow water, 

 some seeming to be stranded, but all making with astonishing 

 impetus over the obstacles to the goal of the river or lake 

 behind the river. Poachers have before now trained dogs to 



