INTRODUCTORY 41 



in endeavouring to reconcile the statements of the different witnesses. 



Perhaps the views of anglers should be received with caution, but 

 I may submit this opinion concerning Tweed " bull trout " given me by 

 an angler residing on Tweedside, who is himself a close student of fish 

 and their habits and from whose pen any work on the Salmonidce would 

 be of great value. " I am afraid I am not an authority on the subject," 

 he modestly wrote me, " but f hold that sea-trout, salmon-trout, and 

 bull-trout are one and the same fish. They vary very much in size 

 only — from \ lb. to, say, 25 lbs." So, too, Mr. John James Hardy, of 

 Alnwick, wrote me when f inquired if he could furnish me with a 

 characteristic photograph of an Aln or a Coquet " bull trout " : — " The 

 trouble is that my opinion is that the Coquet so-called bull trout is only 

 an overgrown sea-trout; that there is no difference between the bull 

 trout and the sea-trout, and that Salmo eriox exists only in imagination." 

 It is difficult to get over the fact, however, that as far back as the time 

 of Izaak Walton, the " bull trout " was a noticeable fish. " There is 

 also," said his Piscator, " in Northumberland a trout called a bull trout, 

 of a much greater length and bigness than any in the southern parts " ; 

 and Walton's detailed description of the " Fordidge " trout differs in 

 no essentials from a modern description of the " bull trout," of which 

 it may generally be said, if one be caught, that " that trout bit not for 

 hunger but wantonness." 



This subject is of course one which is frequently dealt with in 

 current angling literature, and in the pages of " The Fishing Gazette " 

 and " The Field " one finds constant references to the " bull trout." 

 I have often curiously examined accounts of the fish to see if there is 

 any recognisable distinction between them and sea-trout, but it is not 

 easy to find anything in their habits that distinguishes " bull trout " 

 from big sea-trout, and not much more in their appearance than a more 

 pronounced convexity of tail. 



It seems to me, therefore, admitting the characteristic of the " round 



