COMMON SALMON, 43 



the spawning time they may entirely neglect their 

 food, as the Phocae called sea-lions and sea-bears 

 are known to do for months together during the 

 breeding season, and it may be that, like those 

 animals, the Salmon return to sea lank and leaUj^ 

 and come from it in good condition. It is evident 

 that at times their food is both fish and worms, 

 for the angler uses both with good success, as well 

 as a large gaudy artificial fly, which the fish pro- 

 bably mistakes for a gay Libellula or dragon-fly. 

 The capture about the Tweed is prodigious : in a 

 good fishery, often a boat load, and sometimes 

 near two, are taken in a tide. Some few years ago 

 there were above seven hundred fish taken at one 

 hawl, but from fifty to an hundred is very frequent : 

 the coopers in Berwick then begin to salt both 

 Salmon and Gilses in pipes and other large vessels, 

 and afterwards barrel * them to send abroad, having 

 then more than the London markets can take off 

 their hands. Most of the Salmon taken before 

 April, or to the setting in of warm w eather, is sent 

 fresh to London in baskets, unless now and then 

 the vessel is disappointed by contrary winds of sail- 

 ing immediately, in which case the fish is brought 

 ashore again to the cooper's ofiices and boiled, 

 pickled, and kitted, and sent to the London markets 

 by the same ship, and fresh Salmon put into the 

 baskets in lieu of the stale ones. At the beginning 

 of the season, when a ship is on the point of sailing, 



* ^The Salmon barrel holds above forty-two gallons wine 

 measure. 



