60 THE SCOTTISH ANGLER. 



CHAPTER VII. 

 THE PIKE. 



THE pike inhabits many of our waters, and affords to 

 the angler no small sport. In some parts of Scotland, 

 it grows to an immense size, having been repeatedly 

 killed upwards of sixty pounds weight, in Lochs Ven- 

 nachar and Lomond, as also in the south-west of Scot- 

 land, and, we believe, at Lochmaben. Where trout 

 abound, this fish thrives in style ; acquiring a peculiar 

 delicacy of flavour, foreign to the dry coarse jacks met 

 with in English rivers. It also shows a strength and 

 vigour, when hooked, very different from its usual in- 

 difference and want of activity. We have seen it leap 

 about, like a fresh-run salmon, in order to get quit of 

 the hook, and in some instances it has made away 

 with our faithless gimp, while in the very act of bring- 

 ing it to land. 



It has been insisted on among naturalists that the 

 pike is not native to Great Britain, but introduced into 

 the country about three centuries ago. Whether this 

 be true or not, is of little consequence, although we 

 are very apt, judging from appearances, to question it. 

 There are many places, in Rosshire for instance, where 

 this fish is found, to which no one would ever dream 

 of fetching it, and where its existence is fearfully pre- 

 judicial to the increase of that more valuable fish, the 

 salmon. We have no doubt, that on the Conan, and 

 Black Water, one of its branches, at least half of the 

 salmon fry are annually massacred to satiate the appe- 

 tite of this destroyer ; on Tay, too, it does infinite mis- 



