Natural History of the Sea Trout, i o i 



finest sea trout colour, and nothing can be better 

 for the table. Indeed, it must even be a matter of 

 doubt if the Salmo brachyopoma is a distinct species, 

 or only a sea trout in disguise, or a hybrid between 

 Salmo trutta and Salmo fario. It certainly is the 

 only migratory species with a double set of vome- 

 rine teeth. Yarrell, in his " History of British 

 Fishes," makes the Fordwich trout of Izaak Walton 

 the Salmo trutta (which is found in the Stour), but 

 Walton's account is so totally different to anything 

 appertaining to this fish, that it may be a ques- 

 tion whether it was a Salmonoid at all ? Walton 

 only writes from hearsay, and says it never rises 

 at fly or bait, and its flesh in season is white. 

 Was it not the Basse, which is vulgarly called 

 on the Kentish and other coasts, the sea salmon ? 



Dr. Giinther, in " The Study of Fishes," page 

 178, says : " Hybridism is another source of 

 changes and variations within the limits of 

 species, and is by no means so scarce as has 

 been believed hitherto ; it is only apparently of 

 exceptional occurrence, because the life of fishes is 

 more withdrawn from our direct observation than 

 that of terrestrial animals. It has been observed 

 among species of Serranus, Pleuronectidae, Cypri- 

 nidae, Clupeidae, and especially Salmonidce" 



Now will not this hybridism account for some of 

 the extraordinary species figured and described by 



