180 PROPAGATION OF TROUT IN AMERICA. 
of the rainbow, and occupies a distinguished position in the science of 
gastronomy. 
The brook trout differs in appearance and flavour, according to the 
waters it inhabits, but its satin surface retains in all waters, a sprinkling 
of carmine spots, surrounded by a halo of azure, with occasionally spots 
as round as shot, of brown and yellow or white. Its tail is also nearly 
square, instead of forked. Its first dorsal fin is formed of soft rays, and 
its second is merely an adipose protuberance. Its meat ranges in colour 
from that of the pinky-meated salmon to the mallow-colour, the latter 
being preferred by epicures, as indicating the condition of creamy succu- 
lency between its laminar flakes. By these pen-hints all may know a 
brook trout, for, though different waters may shade its back from a 
golden brown tinged with green to sooty black, yet its carmine spots 
will always be visible and the meat always more or less approximate 
to that of the salmon in colour. We are thus particular in describing the 
surface marks of the trout, in order that a chubb shall not be mistaken 
for one, as is the case in Virginia, or a white bass, as has been the case 
farther south. 
The trout, in disposing of its spawn, follows the the identical rules 
which govern the salmon in this important process. It thrives best in 
spring streams, and mates in July or August with one of its same size, 
and the pair feed and remain together until spawning time, which is 
September and October, sometimes much later, but these are the princi- 
pal spawning months for this latitude. As the spawning season ap- 
proaches, the trout in pairs run up rivers, torrents and brooks, to seek 
out near the springy sources of the stream the most retired water 
flowing over gravelly bottoms for their annual operation. There the 
female digs a trench in the gravel with her nose, and when ready to 
deposit her spawn she swims round and round with great celerity, the 
male fish following her, and, as she ejects the ova into the trenches, he 
discharges the milt which impregnates the ova ; and after this process is 
finished the female covers up the trenches and stands sentry over them 
to prevent the male trout and other enemies such as eels, roach, &c, 
from uncovering her nests and eating her eggs. 
For the knowledge adequate to enable a person to propagate trout or 
salmon by artificial means (the manner of propagating trout and salmon 
are the same), a person should understand the habits of the trout in the 
natural progress of propagation, and then imitate it as nearly as possible 
by artificial means. 
Fishes of the genus Salmo are less prolific than the Clupia tribe, the 
fecundity of which baffles computation, varying from the carp, with its 
300,000 eggs — according to Blumenbach, to the sturgeon with its 1,487,500 
— as recorded by Lowenoeck — and who states this to be nothing to the 
fecundity of the cod, one of which he estimated to contain " upwards of 
9,000,000 eggs." 
We think ifc'willbe ascertained that as animals rise in the scale of 
