SALMONOIDEiE. 149 



pical researches of Dr. Knox have shown, as we have already mentioned, that its 

 food, previous to its quitting the salt water, consists of the eggs of various echino- 

 dermata and crustacece, this rich aliment giving the colour and flavour for which 

 its flesh is so highly prized. On entering the freshwater for the purpose of spawn- 

 ing, it seems, like many other animals in the nuptial season, to lose its appetite for 

 food, but will rise occasionally to the natural or artificial fly, and has been known 

 to take both the minnow and worm *. Salmon in prime condition are taken in 

 estuaries at every period of the year, but they do not quit the sea in considerable 

 numbers until the summer is well advanced, and they continue in the tide-way? 

 ascending with the flood and descending with the ebb, until the spawning season 

 approaches. At first the fish has a bright silvery hue, with deep black spots on the 

 back and sides, a head small when compared with the girth of the plump body 

 loaded with juices and fat, the spawn occupies but little space, the salmon-louse 

 (Caligus piscinus) adheres to the gills, and tape-worms fill the intestines. As the 

 reproductive organs advance to maturity, the salmon hastens up the river towards 

 the gravelly deposits in the upland streams, which are its proper spawning places, 

 surmounting the natural and artificial barriers that oppose themselves to its pro- 

 gress with surprising agility. Pennant mentions the perpendicular falls of Ken- 

 nerth and Pont Aberglasslyn, in Wales, Leixlip, in Ireland, and East-eivel on the 

 Tummil, in Scotland, as salmon-leaps, which evince the extraordinary muscular 

 efforts that the fish is capable of making; and travellers have recorded with admi- 

 ration its perseverance in working its way up the cataracts of the Norwegian and 

 Lapland rivers. Soon after its entrance into the fresh water, the dark spots on 



close of the autumn, when the salmon taken in the rivers are lean and no longer saleable, the maritime Laplanders are 

 accustomed to row out a little from the shore into the deep, to take the salmon (who at this time of the year remain im- 

 moveable at the bottom of the sea), with an iron-headed spear, called in Lapland Harses. Lest the darkness of the night 

 should obstruct them in this business, a fire is made on the prow of the vessel of pieces of fir-tree and the bark of the 

 birch, which they call bared." (Pinkerton's Voy., i., p. 427.) The salmon while feeding upon the ova of eehinodermata 

 will, no doubt, remain almost stationary ; but if they continue in a moderate depth of water, so as to be attracted by the 

 light of a torch, or easily speared, one would expect them to be occasionally taken in the trawl-nets in such constant use 

 in the British Channel. 



* Mr. Niell relates that salmon kept along with other sea-fish in a salt-water pond in Galloway, were fed with eels, 

 shell-fish freed from the shell, and herrings cut into pieces. The habits of fish in captivity do not furnish correct indica- 

 tions of the food they would prefer when at liberty ; but the following passage in Sir William Jardine's paper tends to 

 prove, that salmon do not feed exclusively on crustacea, entomostraca, or the ova of eehinodermata. during their residence 

 in the ocean, though it is certain that it is the remains of these substances which are chiefly distinguishable among the 

 mucus which thickly lines the intestines of salmon when they ascend rivers in spawning condition. " In the north of 

 Sutherland a mode of fishing salmon is sometimes successfully practised in the firths, where sand-eels are used for bait : 

 a line is attached to a buoy or bladder, and allowed to float with the tide up the narrow estuaries. The salmon are also 

 said to be occasionally taken at the lines set for haddocks, baited with sand-eels. At the mouths of rivers they rise freely 

 at the artificial fly within fifty yards of the sea, and the common earth-worm is a deadly bait for the clean salmon." The. 

 following additional remark occurs in a note : •' Faber. in his Natural History of the Fishes of Iceland, remarks, thai 

 the Common salmon feeds on small fishes, and various small marine animals — Fleming says its favourite food in the sea 

 is the sand-eel." (Jardine, /. e.) 



