76 TROUT FISHING. 



of the position of these haunts, has such a 

 decided advantage over another without such 

 knowledge, however skilful he may be in other 

 respects. The colours of Trout will vary in 

 the same waters ; those that lie hidden under 

 cover of the trees, or beneath overhanging 

 banks and bushes, are much darker and yellower 

 than those that are found in the unshaded 

 stream with clear sandy bottom, which are 

 altogether as silvery and bright. In some 

 rivers they rarely exceed a, couple of pounds 

 in weight, but in some of the Welsh and Irish 

 lakes they grow to a great size. 



A distinguished member of another branch 

 of the Trout family, Salmoferox, which weighed 

 thirty-nine pounds and a half, was taken in the 

 River Awe in 1866; in many of the Scotch 

 lochs they run very large, and are principally 

 taken with the spinning-bait. 



The Thames still contains splendid Trout 

 of great weight, but these are getting every 

 year more and more scarce and shy ; the old 

 weirs with their plank aprons, under which they 

 used to live, are being exchanged for concrete 

 and stone, and the want of these old covers 

 and hiding-places, together with the clearance 

 of many old stumps and roots, has consider- 

 ably injured the Thames as a home for large 

 Trout; and although the stock of small ones is 

 constantly receiving additions in the shape of 

 importations from High Wycombe and else- 

 where, still these are not the old veritable 



