THE GREAT LAKE TROUT. 253 



character. The pectoral, ventral, and anal fins, 

 are very muscular on their anterior edges, and of 

 a rich yellowish-green colour, darker towards their 

 extremities. We have been unable to satisfy our- 

 selves regarding the existence of any permanent or 

 even prevailing difference in the number of the fin 

 rays in this species and the common trout. Those 

 of the dorsal fin seem to us to vary from thirteen 

 to fifteen, as they do in the ordinary trout from 

 twelve to fourteen, and the rays of the other fins 

 likewise present an occasional (it may be a charac- 

 teristic) variation in both species. 



The flavour of this great lacustrine fish is coarse 

 and indifferent. The colour of the flesh is orange- 

 yellow, not the rich salmon-colour of a fine common 

 trout in good season. The stomach is very capa- 

 cious, and on dissection differing singularly in this 

 respect from the salmon is almost always found 

 gorged with fish. 



We have found of late years that the species is 

 much more common than it once was deemed. 

 Those of Ullswater seem but seldom to attain be- 

 yond a weight of eight or ten pounds, but a much 

 greater size is by no means infrequent in Lochs 

 Awe and Laggan, and enormous specimens are also 

 captured still further north, in Lochs Shin, Loyal, 

 Assynt, and several smaller lochs of Sutherland.* 



* " At Mr. Young's we met Mr. Mackay, son of the keeper of the 

 Duchess's cottage at Lairg, who informed us that he had seen the 

 large trout of Loch Shin, fourteen and fifteen pounds weight, spawn- 

 ing in the small stream that connects Loch Shin with the little loch 

 above it. His father told us afterwards that he had taken them from 

 twelve to fifteen pounds, with set lines, baited with a small trout. 

 Y 



