FISHES. 293 



Salmo alpinus, L. Char. 



Said by Low to have been caught in the loch of Stenness, but we 

 have no later or other evidence of their existence there. 

 Indeed, the only place in Orkney where these fish exist is in 

 the loch of Helial, or Helldale, in Hoy, and Mr. Moodie-Heddle, 

 the proprietor, has sent us the following note about them : " Only 

 in HelliaPs, or Helldale's, Water in Hoy. This loch is very 

 deep, over 12 fathoms in places. Wallace mentions Stenness 

 as a locality, but he has undoubtedly in this, as in much else, 

 made a mistake. It is quite unsuited to Char, from its ex- 

 treme shallowness. Belial's Water is over one-and-a-half miles 

 long, by perhaps 500 yards broad on an average, and I have 

 got as many as twenty-two Char in it on one set line, but 

 only once caught a couple on the rod." 



Mr. Cowan informs us that he sent some Char to General 

 Burroughs for the Muckle Water in Eousay, but we have never 

 heard how they fared since. 



Osmerus eperlanus (L.). Smelt. 



Mr. Moodie-Heddle gives Watersound as a locality for this 

 species. 



Thymallus vulgaris, NUss. Grayling, 



[Obs. Low gives this fish a place in his Fauna, and, from the way 

 he writes of it, seemed to consider it common. There is 

 nothing in his description to indicate what species he mistook 

 for it.] 



Family CLUPEIDJE. 



Clupea harengus, L. "Herring, 



At the time when Wallace wrote there was a herring-fishery in 

 Orkney, which seems to have been principally prosecuted by 



