ON THE BEST KINDS OF FISH FOE EIVEES. 135 



trout will not in any way interfere with any other 

 fish, and they are next in value, both for the table 

 and the sportsman, to the salmon itself; and any one 

 who has seen the manner in which some of the wes- 

 tern Irish rivers and lakes swarm with this delicious 

 and game fish, will readily testify to the value of such 

 an introduction.. In some of our southern rivers, 

 where they are called " bouge," they are little inferior 

 in size and the estimation they are held in to the 

 salmon proper. 



At the charr I must pause. Charr at one time 

 were far more plentiful in this country than they 

 are now. Their principal habitat was the Lake 

 district, when few of the lakes were without them. 

 They are found also in many of the Irish lakes, in 

 one or two in Wales, and perhaps some half-dozen 

 or a dozen in Scotland. The practice, however, of 

 taking these fish in such vast quantities in nets, 

 when they come into the shallow water to spawn, 

 has terribly thinned them, and in many lakes they 

 are very much reduced in numbers. The charr, 

 moreover, is the most delicious fish that inhabits our 

 fresh waters, and this, too, is another incentive to 

 its destruction. There are, according to some ichthyo- 

 logists, several species of charr ; according to others," 

 they are simply varieties. It is believed by some 



