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Severn. The fishing is performed with nets, and sometimes 
with a kind of locks or weirs made on purpose, which in 
certain places have iron or wooden grates so disposed, in an 
angle, that, being impelled by any force in a contrary di- 
r'ection to the course of the river, they may give way and 
open a little at the point of contact, and immediately shut 
again, closing the angle. The salmon, therefore, coming 
up into the rivers, are admitted into these gates, which open, 
and suffer them to pass through, but shut again, and pre¬ 
vent their return. The salmon is also caught with a spear, 
which they dart into him when they see him swimming near 
the surface of the water. 
The capture of salmon in the Tweed, about the month of 
July, (says Mr. Pennant), is prodigious. In a good fishery, 
often a boat load, and sometimes near two, are taken in a 
tide: some years ago there were above 700 fish taken at one 
hawl, but from 50 to 100 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 far more than the London markets can 
take off their hands. 
Most of the salmon caught in Northumberland, in the 
Tyne and Tweed, are sent to London; in the conveyance 
of which a great improvement lias taken place of late years 
by packing them in pounded ice, instead of straw; by this 
method they are presented nearly as fresh at the London 
market as when taken out of the river. For the purpose of 
carrying them, and keeping up a constant and regular sup¬ 
ply, vessels called smacks sail three times a-week, and, being 
purposely constructed for swift sailing, frequently make 
their run in forty-eight hours: these vessels are from 70 to 
120 tons burlhen; twelve men on an average are employed 
in each vessel; they make about fourteen voyages in a year; 
and not less than 75 boats and 300 fishermen are employed 
in taking the fish in the river Tweed. 
Ireland (particularly the north) abounds with this fish: 
the most considerable fishery is at Cranna, on the river 
Ban, about a mile and a half from Coleraine. “When I 
made the tour of that hospitable kingdom in the year 1754,” 
says Mr. Pennant, “ it was rented by a neighbouring gentle¬ 
man for 620/. a-year; who assured me, that his predecessor 
gave 1600/. per annum and was a much greater gainer by 
the bargain, on account of the number of poachers who 
destroy the fish in the fence months.” The mouth of this 
river faces the north; and is finely situated to receive the fish 
that roam along the coast in search of an inlet into some 
fresh water, as they do all along that end of the kingdom 
which opposes itself to the northern ocean. We have seen 
near Ballicastle, nets placed in the sea at the foot of the 
promontories that jut into it, which the salmon strike into as 
they are wandering close to shore; and numbers are taken 
by that method. In the Ban they fish with nets 18 score yards 
long, and are continually drawing night and day the whole 
season, which we think lasts about four months; two sets of 
sixteen men each alternately relieving one another. The 
best drawing is when the tide is coming in: we were told, 
that at a single draught there were once 840 fish taken. A 
few miles higher up the river is a weir, where a considerable 
number of fish that escape the nets are taken. 
The Norwegians have a particular method for drawing the 
salmon to their shores: they cover the rocks so as to make 
them look of the colour of waves running into the sea, 
which the salmon will follow. In the parish of Christiansand 
in Norway, between some very steep rocks, there is a re¬ 
markable and dangerous salmon -fishery in the river Mandal, 
near Bieland-bridge, which is built on piles protruding into 
the river. It is described as follows:—Not far from the 
bridge, to the north, the river forms a large cataract over a 
hollow rock. The fishermen venture into this hollow, on 
osier baskets which are made fast to one of the piles to pre¬ 
vent their being swallowed up in the gulph; if this pile 
breaks, the men are lost; if they run against the rocks, 
which has often happened, they are dragged out half dead 
by their companions; but if the beam holds firm, they swim 
M O. 587 
on their rafts of osier, into the inmost hollows of the rocks, 
where the salmons abide: they drive them thence, to the 
number of twenty or more at a time, and their companions 
catch them as they come out.—Many are also taken in 
Sweden, and in the Gulph of Bothnia, near Laponia; they 
are found likewise in those fresh waters which run from the 
mountains upon the melting of the snow. In Holland, at 
the mouth of the Rhine and Meuse, salmon are taken in 
plenty, as also near Schonhoren from the 16th of May till 
the 10th of June. 
Dr. Schsepf saw this fish in the river Connecticut, in 
America; there they pickle it, and then carry it to New 
York. It resembles the European in size and taste; but, 
according to this author, it is not found in the rivers of 
South America.—They are taken from time to time in Green¬ 
land. According to Professor Falck, salmon are taken, but 
not frequently, in the Wolchow, near Novogorod. The 
Tartars tan the skin, and make clothes of it. 
Salmon is excellent food, especially in spring, when fat; 
but this very fatness requires a strong stomach to digest it. 
However, all waters do not produce them equally good; 
those in the Rhine and Weser are better than those in the 
Elbe; yet the flesh is more tender of those that have re¬ 
mained some time time in the Milde, which runs into the 
Elbe near Dessau. It is the same with the salmon of the 
Oder, whose flesh is lean and tough; but those that quit 
that river for the Varthe, the Netze, and the Kuddow, ac¬ 
quire in those rivers a tender pleasant taste. At Schneidmul, 
in East Prussia, a salmon from the Kuddow will sell for a 
ducat; whereas one of the same size from the Netze, which 
is not far from that place, is worth no more than half-a- 
crown. The flesh of this salmon is reddish; the fatter it 
is, the finer. It swells when smoked or dressed; and cooks 
know how to give it the best look by soaking or frequently 
dipping it in fresh water before they boil it. In spawning¬ 
time it is thin, whitish, and ill-tasted; at which time the 
males have brown spots and little risings on the scales. 
When it first returns to the sea after spawning, it is thin also 
and is called wracklacks by the Swedes. The young, after- 
passing the winter in fresh water, go to the sea the next 
year; then they are called smelts; in the second year they 
are called sprods; in the third, morts: the fourth, fork- 
tails; the fifth, half-Jish; the sixth they attain their Lull 
growth, and then gain their proper name, salmon . Num¬ 
bers of the early salmon, or smelts, are fished up about Basle 
and Strasbourg; they are taken by placing the nets in such 
a manner that the fish enter them by following the stream, 
whereas those for taking full-grown salmon should be placed 
in a contrary direction. The destroyers of salmon, besides 
man, are the shark, sea-eagle, and sea-vulture; the latter 
sometimes lose their lives when they attack a large one; for 
the fish, when attacked, sinks to the bottom, with the claws 
of his enemy sticking to his back, who thus is drowned. 
The grayling is also an enemy to the salmon. 
Salmon is prepared for keeping in the following manner: 
It is cut in pieces, cleaned, cleared of blood, and sprinkled 
with Spanish salt; after being left some weeks in this state, 
it is put in casks, and covered with brine; it takes a quarter 
of a ton of salt to a ton of salmon. Before boiling, the 
salt should be washed off. The following is the process of 
smoking: The fish is split, and has the back-bone taken 
out; it is left in salt four days, then cleaned, and afterwards 
exposed to the smoke a fortnight or three weeks; then it is 
to be kept in a current of air. Those of a middling size are 
fittest for smoking; the small ones decay too soon, the larger 
ones do not take the smoke so easily. 
The salmon dies not not only soon after being taken out 
of the water, but also in small reservoirs and troughs, unless 
placed in the middle of rivers. To preserve the taste, in¬ 
deed, it should be killed as soon as it is caught, which is 
commonly by stabbing it near the tail with a knife. It is 
remarked that this fish will keep several weeks without 
spoiling, though it be very fat: “I have frequently,” says 
Bloch, “ received it fresh in straw after being carried 70 
miles; 
