THE LAKE TROUTS. 
467 
in his pickled state, which I procured at the Sault Ste. Marie, on the 
strength of which I can recommend him to all lovers of good eating as 
the very best salt fish that exists in the world. He is so fat and rich that 
when eaten fresh he is unsufferably rank and oily, but when salted and 
broiled, after being steeped for forty-eight hours in cold water, he is not 
surpassed or equaled by any fish with which I am acquainted. Since my 
return he has been tasted by very many gentlemen of my acquaintance, 
and by no one of them has he been pronounced anything less than super¬ 
lative. His habits closely resemble those of the ‘Namaycush,’ and, like 
him, I cannot learn that he ever takes the fly or is ever taken by trolling. 
I do not, however, believe that either of these methods is often resorted 
to for his capture, although there are many scientific fly-fishers about the 
Sault, and the Brook Trout of those waters are principally taken with large 
and gaudy lake-flies. The average weight of the f Siskawitz ’ does not ex¬ 
ceed four or five pounds, though he is taken up to seventeen. His excel¬ 
lence is so perfectly understood and acknowledged in the lake country that 
he fetches double the price per barrel of his coarser big brother, the 
‘ Namaycush’; and he is so greedily sought for there that it is difficult to 
procure him, even at Detroit, and impossible almost, at Buffalo.” 
Milner states that the Siscowet lives at depths greater than forty fathoms, 
and feeds chiefly upon a species of fresh-water sculpin. It spawns in Sep¬ 
tember in deep water. The average size is about four and one-half pounds. 
Two five-pound fish yielded respectively 2,796 and 3,120 eggs. This 
species, like the Lake Trout, is for the most part taken in gill-nets. 
Mr. George Barnston, of Montreal, Canada, formerly of the Hudson 
Bay Company, who made an extensive natural history collection on Lake 
Superior, claims that there is a third species of Lake Trout, different from 
the Siscowet, on the south shore of Lake Superior, called the “ Mucqua ” 
or “ Bear Trout.” 
Mr. Robert Ormsby Sweeny, chairman of the Minnesota fish commission, 
in a letter dated Saint Paul, Minnesota, October 19, 1880, conveys the 
following information concerning the Siscowet, which is more precise and 
comprehensive than anything hitherto published : 
“ I have not only examined the Siskowet carefully myself and compared 
them with Agassiz’s formulas, but asked and consulted with traders, voy¬ 
agers, Indians and half-bloods, and fishermen, in regard to their habits, 
size, color, weight, etc., and all come to the same conclusion. They are 
not possibly a ‘ Namaycush ’ and should never be considered the same fish. 
The name ‘Sis-ko-wet’ is an Ojibewa word, and means literally ‘ cooks 
itself.’ The fish when fresh is most deliciously rich, tasting like the belly 
