THE SMELT 61 



mien ; but the gillies have good cause to hate 

 the 'sawbills,' as they call them, because of the 

 many smolts which gasp their last in the serrated 

 mandibles of these active fellows. 



XXIII 



There is a humble member of the noble family 



of Salmon which deserves more consi- 



The Smelt 

 deration than has been shown it hitherto. 



The smelt, or, as we call it in Scotland, the spar- 

 ling, known in France as the tperlan (Osmerus eper- 

 lanus\ is usually classed by fishermen among those 

 technically known as 'white fish,' in distinction 

 from 'red fish,' a term applied to salmon and trout. 

 As a white fish, it has been captured and sold for 

 centuries, and not one of the innumerable Salmon 

 Fishery Acts affected it in the slightest degree. So 

 matters might have continued till, not very long 

 ago, it was discovered that meddlesome men of 

 science, never weary of dissecting, classifying, and 

 inventing long-tailed names, had assigned the 

 smelt a distinguished position between the char 

 and the grayling, to which it was clearly en- 

 titled in virtue of possessing an adipose fin and 

 other structural peculiarities. Henceforth, the un- 



