128 NOTES ON i'lSH AND FISHING. 



fish. Unlike our other fresh-water fish, it spawns in the 

 winter months, and thus follows the habits of the salmon, 

 making its way into shallow water and routing up the 

 gravel to cover the ova. The majority of trout pro- 

 bably only spawn in alternate years. A trout is a long- 

 lived fish, and there are authenticated instances of its 

 living over twenty years. In the back-yard of a farm- 

 house at the head of Chapel-le-Dale, Yorkshire, I saw 

 several trout in a little pool which issued from a 

 rock, and was told that they had been there nearly 

 twenty years. They spent most of their time in the dark 

 under the rock, but came out into the light directly food 

 was thrown to them. The trout in most rivers is of slow 

 growth ; and it is a remarkable fact, which I have not yet 

 heard satisfactorily explained, that in many rivers the 

 great majority of trout are of one size within an ounce or 

 two. There seem to be no little and no big ones. Order 

 and discipline evidently reign supreme in the community 

 of river trout, though their chief law seems to be " Might 

 is right." The biggest fish have the choice of haunts, 

 which they rigidly stick to ; and when any number of 

 fish are lying near one another, the rule is in everything, 

 seniores ignores — " the biggest first." Trout pair in the 

 summer, and are credited with being loving husbands and 

 wives, and evincing the utmost solicitude for each other's 

 welfare ; at least in Italian streams, as an Italian author 

 bears witness in his Loves of the Fishes. 



Our ordinary river trout do not generally attain any 

 great size. In many waters, notably in the small 

 streams of Devonshire and Wales, they are reckoned only 

 by ounces, a fish of six or eight ounces being considered a 

 monster. The limit of weight in some rivers is about two 



