ABERDEENSHIRE. 107 



say. Many who eat and who catch salmon can- 

 not tell when they get a clean run fish. Many 

 big (but long) fish are taken in spring, to all ap- 

 pearance clean and caller, but they are foul as 

 sin being fish that have spawned in the upper 

 waters of Don. But while on this point, I am 

 quite certain few, if any, Tweed fish ever repass 

 Ashiestiel Bridge. When once they have 

 passed that bourn to the spawning beds up the 

 river, they may take a farewell of their salt 

 element, for they never return to it. Not so 

 on Don, at least, where I have now arrived. A 

 great many fish pass down after spawning in 

 the upper beds. The leister and other deadly 

 weapons being decidedly less used against them, 

 demoralising manufacturing towns being fewer 

 on its banks ; the consequence is, we find hun- 

 dreds of these in the pools of Don, if great floods 

 have not already swept them away to the sea ; 

 and I have seen us quite annoyed, while fishing 

 for trout, by having all our small flies taken 

 away by a motionless brute, which, by its sheer 

 weight, went off with them. To the eye, I say 

 they are silvery and white, but, on being boiled, 

 they are soft and pale coloured in the flesh. 

 These are known as kelts, or fish which have 



