62 
REVIEWS. 
[Nature and Art, February 1, 1867 
REV I 
The Autobiography of the late Sabno Salar, Esq. Com- 
prising a Narrative of the Life, Personal Adventures, and 
Death of a Tweed Salmon. Edited by a Fisherman. Day 
and Son (Limited), London. 
P ROFUSELY as the subjects of salmon-fishing-, salmon- 
breeding, and salmon law have been written about for 
many years past, the ingenious author of the little work before 
us has contrived to treat them in a novel and most attractive 
manner. His pages, which are clearly the result of sporting 
experience, careful study, and love of nature, profess to 
record, from dictation, a salmon’s personal experiences from 
the egg to the fatal landing-net, and present the fish’s own 
views of the natural history of his race, and of the ways 
and works of his friends and enemies. The waterside 
sketches are the most diverting things of the kind that have 
come under our notice for many a day, and we need make no 
apology to the reader for extracting at length “ The 
Baillie’s misadventure in search of ‘ Saumon Roe.’ ” 
“I was lying listlessly one day in summer thirty feet 
beneath the surface, beyond the influence of the rapid 
stream above, in the fathomless pool called The Pot, some 
half-mile below Merton Bridge, a boat, kept in its place by 
two light oars, floating above me, when the fragments of a 
conversation reached my ears, which by degrees absorbed my 
attention. A river-keeper was detailing to his employer the 
circumstances connected with the capturing of a poacher. 
“ ‘ Ay, sir,’ he said, ‘ but that saumon-roe is a sair 
temptation ; mony a guid mon has been beguiled by it. A’ 
ken ane, a baillie ; a’ took him mysel. ’ 
“‘How came 'that ? Tell us all about it,’ was the 
reply. 
“ ‘ A’ was watching, mebbe six months syne, up in the 
Pavilion Water; the fish were thranging sair upon the 
spawning-beds, and weel a’ kent they were thrang on the 
bank abune the Whirlies. A’ was hidden in the wee brae 
just abune the brig, and a’ hadna’ been there mebbe twa 
hour, when a’ see "a mon come daintily alang. Looking 
carefully this way an’ that, an’ seeing naebody, he just out wi’ 
the gaff, an’, screwing it on to the end of his walking-stick, 
stepped lightly into the water. It wouldna’ be mickle 
abune his knee, an’ the back fin o’ meir than ae great fish 
was plain to be seen on the bank before him. ’Deed, but he 
wasted little time in selection, an’ varra little ceremony he 
treated him with. In a second the gaff was in a puir half- 
spawned beastie, an’, lugging her ashore, he started aff het 
foot towards Melrose. A’ up an’ after him an’ for a weighty 
mon he made mickle running. Wh f en he saw me he dropped 
the fish, but no stopping to pick it up, a’ just kept on under 
the railway brig, down the meadows, by Ailwand Foot, 
under Melrose Brig, an’ there, as he was creeping- up the 
steep bank, a’ grippit hold of him ahint ; a’ grippit hard, an’ 
he turned and said, “ Sandy, lad ! dinna grip sae hard ; ye’ll 
rive ma breeks.” “Ay, Baillie,” said I, “is that you? 
How cam’ ye to do it ? ” And he said quite solemn-like, 
“ Sandy ! ” he said, “ it was neether the need nor the greed, 
but joost the saumon-roe ! ” “ Ech, Baillie,” a’ said, “a’ 
wadna’ have believed it of ye, but it will be dear saumon- 
roe to ye.” And sae it proved, for he was fined five pund, 
and ither harm cam’ of it.’ ” 
On the very high authority of “ Salmo Salar ” the author 
elects to differ here and there from naturalists and sports- 
men who have preceded him ; but without a trace of the 
asperity which, singularly enough, is sometimes adopted in 
their prolusions by followers of the gentle art. On the 
vexed question, for instance, whether a parr is a salmon, or 
in other words, “ when is a parr not a parr,” he is at 
utter variance with the legislature, which has endorsed the 
opinion of many savans that the fishes are indentical. 
“ Salmo ” reports as follows, a conversation between two 
anglers, one of whom had hooked him during his “ Smolt- 
E WS. 
hood,” and then returned him more than half dead, limp, 
faint, and bleeding to his native waters. 
“ Although too weak to move, I retained my senses, and 
heard the younger man say to his companion — 
“ ‘ Why, John, what made you throw that poor little dead 
beast into the water again ? ’ 
“ ‘ ’Deed, was the reply, ‘ yon beastie’s just a smolt, an’ 
there’s a fine for killing sick like.’ 
“ ‘ But you killed a parr just now ? ’ 
“ ‘ Ay.’ 
“ ‘ But you call this a parr ? ’ 
“ ‘ Deed, an’ it’s the fau’t of those who gie the same name 
to twa different fishes.’ 
“ ‘ What do you mean ? ’ 
“ ‘ A’ mean that there’s a wee fish ye killed just noo cae’d 
“ the parr,” an’ it’s a fish of itself, an’ has melt an’ roe as 
every ither fish has, an’ ye’ll find it in rivers an’ burns, an’ 
abune waterfalls, an’ in mountain tarns, where no saumon 
ever yet was seen or could get, an’ it’s streekit an’ barred 
all the same as the young sanmon-parr ; and it’s just the 
confusion of ca’ing the twa by the ae name that’s raised a’ 
the fash that’s made about the “ edentity,” as they ca’ it, 
of the parr with the young- saumon. ’ 
“ 1 Then you believe that the parr 'is not the young of the 
salmon ? ’ 
“ ‘ If ye ca’ the young saumon the parr, the parr is the 
young saumon ; but there’s anither parr that has a better 
right to the name, an’ it’s a pity that twa fish should be bund 
to hae but ae name betwixt them.’ ” 
The Salmon’s way of accounting for his own rapid growth 
must be the last of our quotations. 
“ I have heard wonder expressed that so small a fish as 
the smoult should, in a few short months, increase from the 
weight of three or four ounces to that of frequently twice 
as many pounds. But where is the wonder ? My mother, 
who was murdered on the spawning-beds before half her 
eggs had been deposited, weighed twenty pounds ; the 
noble kipper, her companion, half as much again. What 
would be the weight at more than two years old of a dog-, 
offspring of parents such sizes ? And was ever puppy fed 
as we were fed? No!- Fortes creantur fortibus. Large 
animals and large fishes produce large offspring, and when 
I left the sea and again ascended my native Tweed in July, 
I weighed nearly seven pounds.” 
The portions of this now connected autobiography, which 
appeared from time to time in the pages of “ Macmillan’s 
Magazine,” are already familiar to a large circle of appre- 
ciative readers, and we may safely predict that very general 
favour will attend their publication in a new form, and with 
important additions. 
The Light Blue. A Cambridge University Magazine. Yol. 
II., No. 1. January, 1867. Cambridge, London, and 
Oxford. Rivingtons. 
We are glad to see that the conductors of “Light Blue ” 
have successfully stemmed the perils of a first volume, and 
have entered upon their second in high spirits ; a piece of good 
fortune which many a well-considered attempt to found a 
University periodical has not attained. The contents of 
Vol. II., No. 1, are varied and of promise. The political 
paper at its head, entitled “ The Prospects of the Con- 
servative Party,” is judicious and carefully balanced. 
Mr. Swinburne’s poetical excesses are ably and temperately 
treated, more in sorrow than in anger. A series of papers 
on University topics is well inaugurated by one on 
Cambridge classical honours, and the author has suf- 
ficiently at heart the fame of his alma mater, and the future 
of her sons, to pronounce that she might advantageously adopt 
