122 THE COMPLETE ANGLES. 



strongly marked with, transverse bars and pink spots along the lateral 

 line. The transverse bars are erroneously called "parr 3 * marks, some 

 naturalists confounding the salmon fry with the diminutive trout called 

 the " parr." At two months the fry eagerly feeds upon flies on the 

 surface of the water, and small worms or larva? at the bottom. It goes 

 on slowly increasing in size until it is a year old, when the transverse 

 bar-marks disappear, and it assumes a silvery exterior covering of small 

 scales, called its " migratory" coat. It is now a smolt, and with the 

 first moderate flood it takes its maiden trip to the sea. It feeds therein 

 from two to four months on an average, and then immigrates to its 

 natal river as a "grilse." In the ensuing autumn or winter it breeds for 

 the first time, and returns again to the sea. Having sojourned there 

 the requisite time, it immigrates for the second time and is now an 

 adult, though not an aged salmon. 



It would be impossible for me to write anything more correctly on 

 the growth of salmon than that which I have already written in the 

 "Book of the Salmon," p. 197 to 201, as follows: "At the end of a 

 year, the whole of it passed in fresh water, the young fish, on an average, 

 weigh little more than three ounces. At that weight, being a smolt, 

 it descends to the sea ; and, if it should remain therein, say for eight 

 or nine weeks, and then return to its natural element, fresh water, it 

 will, in ail probability, and no specific circumstances preventing, have 

 increased by the end of that time, to the weight of five pounds or more. 

 This rapidity of increase is most wonderful; and, though an adult 

 salmon has been known to double its weight by sea-food in thirty-eight 

 days, nothing like the increase that takes place between the smolt and 

 grilse states ever after occurs. So, if the growth of salmon during the 

 first year of its existence, is extremely slow in fresh water, it is, after 

 that age, by far more than proportionately rapid in salt water. It will 

 be well to bear in mind, that the growth of salmon is not always pro- 

 portioned to the length of time they sojourn at sea. Several circum- 

 stances affect their rate of physical development. Amongst others 

 indeed they are the chief ones quality and quantity of food found on 

 the salt water feeding-grounds, and hereditary capacity for growth. 

 By ' hereditary capacity/ I mean that the offspring of large fish have 

 the inherent power of growing, and do grow, faster, and to a larger 

 size than the young of salmon of small race. When I speak of large 

 and small salmon, I refer to fish which eventually become very large, 

 and to fish which, no matter what their age, will always be small, in 

 fact, to giant and dwarf breeds. The growth of salmon fry is pretty 

 equal in all rivers ; and, therefore, smolts, no matter whether they are 

 the produce of large or small salmon, will be found in different rivers, 

 not differing much in size. Such is not the case, however, after the 

 smolt stage of existence. After that, the growth of the offspring of 

 large-growing salmon is more rapid than that of the produce of salmon 

 of more diminutive race. The smolts of rivers which produce salmon 

 weighing forty pounds, grow faster to the grilse and in the salmon 

 state, than the smolts of rivers whose largest fish do not exceed twenty 

 pounds ; and faster still than the smolts of rivers, the salmon of which 



