BROOK TROUT. 



" Here, where the willowj thickets lave 

 Their drooping tassels beneath the wave, 

 There lies a deep and darkened pool 

 Whose waters are crystal clear and cool; 

 It is fed by many a gurgling fount 

 That trickles from upland pasture and mount, 

 And where the tree-shadows fall dense and dim 

 The glittering trout securely swim." 



Of the brook trout — the justly prized 'salmon of the fountain' — it 

 may truthfully be said that 'tis the popular favorite among most lovers of 

 fly-tishing in the United States. Like the garnet the speckled trout 

 sparkles for the multitude, while that gem of the first water, the salmon, 

 gleams in its silvery lustre for the favored few. The brook trout is more 

 widely distributed, and therefore more generally known than any other 

 fresh water game fish of the first order, with the exception, possibly, of 

 the black bass. 



The natural habitat of the speckled trout is the section of country 

 comprising the principal Eastern, New England and extreme Northern 

 states, along the Canadian border, and westward to the sources of the 

 Mississippi and those streams tributary to Lake Superior, where some 

 of the largest specimens are found, ranking in size and game qualities 

 with the magnificent trout of Maine waters. The southern range extends 

 to the foot-hills of the Alleghanies, and the headwaters of the Chatta- 

 hoochie, in Georgia, with a moderate number in the North C'"olina 

 tributaries of the Catawba. Many of the fish caught and recorded under 

 the name of brook trout in certain sections of the United States, belong 

 in reality to other species, and the local name, trout, is therefore a mis- 

 nomer, frequently. 



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