288 THE ANGLEK-NATUKALIST. 



the tide up the narrow estuaries. The worm, the minnow, 

 and Parr-tail are all, under certain circumstances, known 

 to be deadly baits for the Salmon; and in an essay 

 published in the Transactions of the Highland Society, 

 vol. ii. p. 392, Mr. Alex. Morrison says, " I have taken 

 Salmon within flood-mark, some of which had two, and 

 others three full-sized herrings in their stomachs." 



Judging from the perfect arrangement of its teeth and 

 the known habits of its allied species, there can be no 

 doubt that the Salmon is a very voracious feeder, al- 

 though the very small amount of food usually found in 

 the stomach has been hitherto a source of difficulty in 

 ascertaining its exact nature. The singularity of this 

 latter circumstance was recently the subject of an interest- 

 ing correspondence in the ' Field/ in which it was sug- 

 gested, amongst other less probable explanations, that the 

 gastric juice of the fish was so powerful as to dissolve 

 almost instantaneously whatever was subjected to its 

 action, another hypothesis being that the fish ejects its 

 food on finding itself hooked or netted. Alluding to these 

 points, Mr. Buckland says, 



" ' Waltonian's ' observation is very important. It goes 

 to prove that the gastric juice of the Salmon is so highly 

 solvent of animal matter, that digestion goes on very 

 rapidly, and that hence actual food is rarely found in their 

 stomachs. Reasoning from analogy, one would think this 

 likely : the digestion of many kinds of swift-flying birds is 

 very rapid, the reason possibly being that a full stomach 



