THE GEAYLING 



exertion of fishing and playing fish in such a gale, that I did not think of 

 the weather tiU I noticed the blue nose of my friend the keeper, who was 

 carrying my net : he shivered so that I sent him home.' 



So much for the little grayling that by many authorities and 

 wise men takes its place among the game fishes of the world. His 

 natural range we have seen is the Arctic and sub-Arctic streams, 

 and so he has wandered, and been carried far a-stream until many 

 lands and rivers claim the flower of fishes. There is but one 

 genus, ThymaUus, so called because the fish has the odour of 

 thyme, but there are five well-known species in. different lands, 

 three of which belong to America. 



The Arctic form, already referred to, attains a length of 

 eighteen inches, and is a most desirable game with a very light 

 rod. Another, the Michigan grayling, was first brought to the 

 attention of the world of anglers and science by the Dean of 

 American anglers, Charles HaUock, who told me the story years 

 ago. He sent a specimen to Agassiz. This is T. tricolor. Its 

 home is in the streams of Southern Michigan where it once 

 reigned supreme. A town was named Grayling and became the 

 centre of interest for anglers. A more attractive little fish can 

 hardly be imagined, and to watch the sensitive and reaUy 

 splendid dorsal rise and fall and fiash in its regal colours in the 

 sunlight is, indeed, a privilege. 



The back bears a rich oUve hue ; the lower surface is a bluish 

 white, while the fins seem to scintillate and glow in tints of pink, 

 old rose, blue, flashes of scarlet and purplish-pink. The side 

 fins are olive-brown tipped with blue ; the ventrals striped in 

 brown and pink. The large powerful tail is deeply forked. Over 

 all, like a sail, rises the splendid red dorsal, splashed or ocelated 

 in red, blue and purple, each framed in emerald-green. 



In Montana is found a grayling that has been given the name 

 of the territory. It lives in the streams which find their way into 

 the Missouri Eiver above the Great Falls, Deep Eiver and 

 streams of the Little Belt Mountains, the Gallatin, Jefferson, 



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