212 Field and Forest Rambles. 



I lost no time in repairing to the scene, and sorting my 

 fishing gear, when at the second throw two salmon trout 

 jumped simultaneously at the brilliant red hackles ; the next 

 minute I struck them, and, after a pretty and exciting run of 

 about five minutes, both were landed on the pier. 



We soon found that it required no great art or skill to 

 capture this fish ; for the Indian, borrowing a piece of line, 

 fastened it to an alder rod, and baiting with a grasshopper, 

 seemed more successful than with my spinning tackle and 

 artificial flies. In spring the fish are more voracious, dashing 

 furiously at any light object drawn rapidly against the current. 

 The alimentary canals of many, dissected on the spot, were, 

 with few exceptions, filled with the small fry of the silvery 

 dace, redfin, roachdace, brook minnow, and red-banded species, 

 besides the two-spined stickleback, with its strong pectoral 

 spines, and another species very plentiful in the stream and 

 adjoining lake. A few stomachs were empty, or contained 

 only a light-coloured mucus. The back and crown of the head, 

 as seen immediately after the fish is taken from it native ele- 

 ment, are of an intense olive-black, profusely spotted with darker 

 spots, which extend to the dorsal fin, and decrease towards the 

 lateral line. The spots on the back are scarcely to be ob- 

 served after exposure for a short time to the atmosphere, and 

 the upper parts rapidly shade into blue-black. The largest 

 out of eight or ten captured by our party measured sixteen 

 inches in length, and its greatest depth, just anterior to the 

 dorsal fin, was three inches and a quarter. The smallest, 

 possibly a third or fourth year fish, measured thirteen inches in 

 length, its greatest depth being two inches and three-quarters. 

 It differed only in the number of spots on the gill covers, there 

 being four and six on opposite sides, whereas nine large 

 rounded spots usually characterize the adult. The fish 

 spawns in the above situation early in November, and also 

 pushes into the lake for the same purpose, where numbers 

 are caught, but they do not jump readily in still water; 



