170 THE NEW AKT OF BREEDING FISH. 



another with such thorough good will as to throw 

 him fairly out of the water. As it is, their battles 

 are bloody enough ; not only are the fish observed to 

 be gashed in every direction — probably by their side 

 teeth, for those in front, or on the tongue cannot be 

 brought properly into play, owing to the hook — but 

 with large pieces of flesh and skin actually hanging 

 down their sides. At the close of the season all the 

 males are covered with soars. Unless one has seen 

 the fish at this time, it is difficult to conceive his 

 mutilated condition, and it appears certain that were 

 it not for the hook not more than a single male sal- 

 mon would leave the spawning ground alive. But it 

 is the males alone who, at the termination of the 

 spawning season, are thus seamed with scars. Ano- 

 ther evidence, were such wanting, that the injuries 

 have arisen from combats between themselves, for, 

 were the wounds inflicted by otters, as many imagine, 

 the females would be equal sufferers with the males, 

 which is not the case." All male animals — man 

 among the rest- — fight and make -fools of themselves 

 to be the lords and masters of females. The jackass 

 is a ferocious ass in this respect, and the stag or hart 

 will knock to smithereens his antlers, and dash hia 

 Turkish brains out in a fiery contest for a harem of 

 hinds. Yet, according to the bulletin of Mr. Keiller, 

 the salmon is the most sanguinary sultan of them 

 all. I have done for the present with quotations 

 from Scandinavian Adventures, the best work by far 

 ever written on the field sports of Northern Europe. 



