THE SALMON. 
447 
arrow ; they gave no warning of their intentions, but up they came, and 
darted out of the surface of the water with a sudden rush like rockets let 
loose from the darkness of the night into the'space above. When they 
first appeared their tails were going with the velocity of a watch-spring 
just broken, and the whole body, sparkling as though they had been en¬ 
ameled, was quivering with the exertion. They looked as much like flying 
fish as ever I saw anything in my life.” 
Observations have recently been made by Dr. A. Landmark, of Nor¬ 
way, on the extent of Salmon leaps. He thinks that the jump depends as 
much on the height of the fall as on the currents below it. If there be a 
deep pool right under the fall, where the water is comparatively quiet, a 
Salmon may jump 16 feet perpendicularly : but such jumps are rare, and 
he can only state that it has taken place at the Hellefos, in the Drams 
River, at Haugsend, where two great masts have been placed across the 
river for the study of the habits of the Salmon, so that exact measure¬ 
ments may be effected. The height of the water in the river of course 
varies, but it is, as a rule, when the Salmon is running up stream, 16 feet 
below these masts. The distance between the two is NA feet, and the 
professor states that he has seen Salmon jump from the river below across 
both masts. Landmark states that when a Salmon jumps a fall nearly per¬ 
pendicular, it is sometimes able to remain in the fall, even if the jump is a 
foot or two short of the actual height. This has been proved by over¬ 
whelming evidence. The fish may be seen trembling, and then rest 
for a minute or two a foot or so below the edge or the fall, with a smart 
twitch of its tail, the rest of the fall is cleared. Only fish which strike 
straight with the snout are able to remain in the falling mass of water; if 
they strike obliquely, they are carried back into the stream below. This, 
Landmark believes to be the explanation of Salmon passing falls with a 
clear descent of 16 feet. 
Although, like trout, and unlike shad, Salmon spawn with a falling 
temperature, not depositing their eggs until the water is at least as cold as 
50°, yet they seem to enter the rivers on a rising temperature. Yarrell 
remarked that English rivers issuing from large lakes afford early Salmon, 
while rivers swollen by melting snows in the spring months are later in 
their season of producing fish, and yield their supply when the lake rivers 
are beginning to fail. In America the Southern streams seem to yield the 
earliest fish. In the Connecticut they appear in April and May, in the 
