Wanderings of a Naturalist 



continuing for a month or six weeks. It can, I think, be 

 put down as certain that a considerable proportion of the 

 later run do not succeed in passing the linn, but have per- 

 force to descend the river and seek fresh spawning beds 

 below. They are not in the same fullness of strength as 

 their fellows of the spring run. Some of them have been 

 six months and more in the fresh water, others have come 

 in from the sea in midsummer, but of true autumn fish I 

 think I am right in saying there is an entire absence, though 

 local authorities assert that certain quick-running salmon 

 make the journey of seventy miles in forty-eight hours, and 

 in autumn too. If the generally accepted theory that salmon 

 do not feed in fresh water be correct, many of the fish 

 visible at the linn in October have undergone a fast the 

 like of which must put completely in the shade the most 

 famous human feats in this respect. 



It is a remarkable instinct that prompts these fish to 

 press forward to the very highest reaches of the river. With 

 true autumn-run salmon it is different : they are content to 

 spawn in the lower reaches, only a few miles from the sea 

 in some instances, and even a large number of spring-run 

 fish regularly conduct their spawning operations many miles 

 below the linn. It is almost certainly the case that the 

 salmon of the linn had their origin in the waters beyond, 

 and that it is this instinct to return to the place of their birth 

 which urges them through the falls. One has only to inspect 

 the pool below the linn to realize at what cost many of the 

 fish attempt the passage. On a certain day I counted between 

 forty and fifty salmon lying only a few feet from the surface, 

 though the water was of great depth at this particular point. 

 The fish showed, a striking absence of fear ; they allowed 

 themselves to be inspected without suspicion, and even a 

 succession of stones thrown in among them only caused them 

 to sheer off slightly. Nearly every one of them bore a white 

 mark on the nose where it had thrown itself against the wall 

 of rock in the last leap, and on one or two of their number 



122 



