49 s 
TUBE-BLADDERED GROUP. 
own kindred devour them without scruple. Unluckily, too, for them, a certain 
number of great, hungry kelts (as the fish are called after spawning), having 
recovered to a great extent their condition, accompany them on their seaward 
journey, and prey upon their young companions as they travel; and I believe 
that a hungry kelt will devour upwards of forty or fifty smolts in a day. Arrived 
at the sea, the little fish are met by a fresh array of enemies. The army of gulls 
is always with them, and these are reinforced by cormorants, divers, and other 
sea-birds, besides which shoals of ravenous fish await their arrival, and assist in 
thinning their ranks. It is wonderful that any should escape, and, but for the 
extraordinary fecundity of the salmon, they would speedily be annihilated; but 
such is their prolific nature that a remnant always survives to return to the 
spawning-beds and keep up the supply. Buckland calculated that the number of 
eggs laid by a salmon was about one thousand to the pound weight, a fish of 
15 lbs. therefore producing fifteen thousand eggs. The food of the smolt during 
his sojourn in the sea is abundant, consisting chiefly of sand-eels, molluscs, and 
marine insects. The smolts increase accordingly very rapidly in size, and in three 
or four months the fish that came down 5 or 6 ounces in weight returns to the 
river from whence he came, a grilse of from 4 to 6 lbs.; the grilse being the fifth 
stage of the salmon’s existence. Unless accidentally prevented the grilse always 
returns to the river from whence it came, and after spending the autumn and 
winter at home, and providing for the continuance of the family by spawning, as 
already described, returns as a kelt to the sea in the following year, reappearing 
the next as a salmon of at least 10 or 12 lbs. weight. It should be added, that, 
after spawning, the fish speedily recover their colour, and to a great extent their 
condition ; the baggit at once losing her dark complexion, and the kipper discarding 
his hideous livery, his great beak being rapidly absorbed, his sides becoming 
silvery, and his back assuming a dark bluish tinge.” 
With reference to the statement in this account that salmon always return to 
the river of their birth, it may be observed that although this is generally the 
case, the circumstance that salmon occasionally make their appearance at the mouth 
of the Thames and other rivers which they have ceased to inhabit, shows that 
there are exceptions to the rule. The obstacles that salmon will surmount in 
their ascent of rivers during the return from the sea are too well-known to require 
notice; but it is probable that the height to which they can leap has been 
exaggerated. The period of spawning varies with the country, taking place in 
the south of Sweden and North Germany at the latter part of October or early 
in November; while in Denmark it may be deferred till February or the 
beginning of March; November and December being the usual spawning-months 
in Scotland. 
Trout In spite of their diversity of habitat, and likewise of coloration 
and structure, Day is of opinion that the migratory sea-trout, or 
salmon-trout (S. trutta), and the stationary river-trout (S. fario), as well as the 
various forms from the British lakes, are nothing more than varieties of a single 
variable race; and it must be confessed that no one has hitherto been able to define 
all the nominal British species with anything like definiteness. Still, however, in 
the modern sense of the words there is no possibility of drawing a hard-and-fast 
