when wishing to leap so great a height, they strike the surface of the water with a kind of double stroke; by this means they overcome obstacles which appear insurmountable. One cause of the salmon's return to fresh water is from a parasitic insect, called lernæa salmonea, which adheres to their scales, and appears to cause an intolerable irritation. This species of louse dies soon after the salmon has been two or three days in fresh Angler in Ireland.

water.

The salmon fisheries are constant and copiou sources of human food. They rank next to agriculture. Their increase does not lessen other articles of human sustenance. Marshal.

The salmon fisheries of Scotland were of great value, but they have for the last twelve or fifteen years decreased. They were, however, let to tenants, and much over-fished; so much so, that the late Duke of Sutherland took them into his own possession, built extensive curing-houses, preserved the rivers during close time, and so regulated the fishing that free access was given to the heavy or breeding-fish, and the kelts, or spawned fish, were allowed to return unmolested to the sea. The consequence of this good management is, that in some rivers the produce has been doubled. It is a mistaken opinion that the spawning season is only between October and

February; in many rivers it would commence in August, if the grounds and entrances were left unmolested. In Sweden the salmon spawn in the middle of summer. The seasons also have much influence. In the North of Scotland, the common earth-worm are a deadly bait for a clean salmon; sand eels are also used for baits; and in the Transactions of the Royal Edinburgh Society, the food of salmon has been examined from their stomachs, when taken from the sea, and said to contain small monoculi, and entomostraced with the ova of starfish. Common salmon are said to feed on small fish, and various small marine animals.-Sir William Jardine on the Common Salmon, Edin. New Phil. Journal.

Angling for Salmon is not more a masculine than a delightful sport, and is pursued with ardour and success in the northern rivers of our island. Some very spirited and lively sketches on this subject are to be seen in Blackwood's Magazine, No. 208-209, 1833. Whilst fishing in Loch Awe, amongst other sport, is mentioned, catching a salmon of twenty-eight pound weight. Awe seems to be a delightful place, and good accommodation there for brothers of the angle. The disciple of Walton who has once indulged in salmon fishing, will feel little satisfaction in the more common pursuits and lesser pleasures of the gentle art. But it requires an expert practitioner

Loch

to insure success, as may be seen by the following anecdote:

When the fish has taken the fly, to pull a hard strain on the line would snap the tackle to pieces, even were it made of wire; ease your hand, and let him rise; take leisure, give him line, but do not slack too fast, and in half-an-hour thou layest him on the bank. Sir Walter Scott.

Salmon Fishing with Spear.-The salmon is caught with a spear, which they dart at him as he swims on the surface of the water. It is customary also to catch him with a candle and lantern, or wisp of straw set on fire; for the fish naturally following the light, are struck with the spear, or taken in a net spread for that purpose, and lifted with a sudden jerk from the bottom. Some few years ago, there were taken in the Tweed seven hundred fish at one hawl, but from fifty to one hundred is frequent.

Encyclopædia Londinensis.

Hunting Salmon.-Hunting fish on horseback seems a somewhat surprising sport; yet this mode has been adopted on the shallows at Whitehaven, with considerable success. Taking advantage of the retiring tide, persons have thus got between the salmon and the sea, and have fairly coursed them, until a spear could be accurately thrown:

forty or fifty have thus been hunted in a day. The plan is, after the fish is struck, to turn the horse to the shore. The Ocean, its Wonders.

Sir Walter Scott mentions similar sport on the Solway Firth. The rapidity of the salmon's motion is such, that this fish has been known to travel at the rate of sixteen miles an hour.

Wonders in Herefordshire.-Salmon are here in season all the year, and are found in the river Wye. Bone Well, near Richard's Castle, is always full of bones of little fishes, of which it can never be emptied, but that they return again. Anglorum Speculum, p. 377.

The salmon were so plentiful in the Severn river, that they have been sold for two-pence halfpenny per pound, but now they fetch two shillings, and three and six-pence: they leave their salt water haunts, and are earlier in the Severn, than any other English river. In January, 1833, a very fine fish, nearly a yard in length, was discovered near the shore, close to where the warm water enters the river from the city engine, at the bottom of Newport-street; it was speared and brought into the city, the captor refused a sovereign for it.

Dr. Hasting's Nat. Hist. of Worcestershire.

At Lillingston Lovel two salmon were taken in a small brook, which may be stepped over, (a branch of the Ouse,) one a yard long, and the other a little less. The curious would be glad to know how they came there, near two hundred miles from the sea.-Plot's Natural History of Oxford.

The abundance of salmon is so great in the Kamtschatka rivers, as to force the water before them, and dam up the streams so as to make them overflow their banks, and great quantities of salmon are left on the dry ground,—if it was not for violent winds, assisted by the bears and wild dogs feeding on them, the fish left would soon produce a pestilence, their stench is so powerful. Daniel.

In the famous cruives, or weirs, for taking salmon in the river Galway, where they are kept until sold, in a large pool supplied with running water, it is a most beautiful spectacle to watch them playing about. Angler in Ireland.

By the appellation of white and red fish, the peasantry distinguish the salmon of Goolamore, when in and out of season; indeed, the colour is such a perfect indicative of health, that any person who has frequented a salmon river will, on

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