SENSE OF TASTE IN FISH.

269

that of hearing, and greatly inferior to that of sight.

Taste is at all times, and in all animals, a modification of common sensation, or the simple sense of touch. Its seat in fishes is probably the whole interior of the mouth, the tongue of these creatures, being, as is well known, very small and very imperfectly developed. The observations which we have previously made with regard to sensation and to the vital organs of that faculty—the hemispheres are applicable here. We cannot give the fish credit for any refinement of taste, and taste, with touch and feeling, must be content to occupy the lowest rank of the nervous senses.

It is impossible to regard the distribution of the higher faculties of the fish, which is here pourtrayed, without a sentiment of admiration of the wisdom and goodness of Providence, that has thus restricted the sensations of a large group of creatures, living in an element of danger, and destined to be the prey of the more powerful of their own kind as well as of the other classes of animals. They have the eye to see, the ear to apprehend, and the muscular system to escape danger. They have also a power of smell to discriminate the qualities of the stream which it is their pleasure to seek. While the absence of nicety of taste renders them unheedful of the savour of their food, and an imperfect sensation

270

PRACTICAL OBSERVATIONS.

saves them from the pangs which they otherwise must feel in the grasp of their destroyer.

The angler who studies these observations, and would avail himself of the lesson which they convey, will judge how far it is necessary to keep out of the sight of fish, and refrain from making a noise, to what extent fish suffer torment from the hook, and how far it is useful to employ scented baits to please their palates.

NATURAL HISTORY OF THE SALMON. 271

CHAPTER X.

THE HABITS OF THE ANGLER'S FISH, AND THE BEST WAYS

THE natural history of this splendid fish, the pride and profit of the great rivers of the British Isles, was not known until about ten years ago. The greatest natural historians from the French Lacépède down to our own observant Yarrell, were ignorant of many of the main features of its existence. Until the period alluded to we were nearly all in error with respect to its growth, and we thought the parr a distinct species. We have now ascertained its growth, and know positively that the parr is a young salmon of the first year, a fact the knowledge of which is of importance with respect to the preservation of the fish. The day may come when the killing of parr will be made universally a penal offence. We also know

272

DEPOSITING THE OVA.

that up to its second year the growth of salmon is exceedingly slow; that afterwards it is wonderfully rapid, but in salt water only. Once a grilse or a salmon, fresh water is fatal to its growth.

I shall, before I enter into detail, give in a very few words the salient points of the salmon's natural history. The female salmon, viz. the fish with what is commonly called the "hard roe," deposits its eggs, spawn, or ova, in gravel beds, in the autumn and winter months. Simultaneously with deposition, the ova are impregnated by the spawn (the milt) of the male fish, or "soft-roe," being exuded over them. That is the active process of procreation. The deposited eggs or ova are hatched on an average in from ninety to one hundred and forty days; duration of time depending on the temperature of the water. The warmer the water the more rapid is the work of incubation. In a few days after expulsion from the ova the incubated matter assumes the fish shape. This embryo salmon grows slowly, and remains for the first year the diminutive parr or fingerling. On completing its first year it changes its coat, and indeed its shape. The parr or samlet marks and spots disappear, and it becomes the silver-grey smolt, salmon fry, or lastspring. Its first year or thereabouts being completed, it migrates for the first time to the sea, and in two or three months or more returns to its parent river

GROWTH OF SALMON.

273

a gilse or grilse, having increased a pound and more during every month it has tarried in sea water. About the end of its second year or the beginning of its third (I am speaking of the female fish, for the puerile parr will breed, horresco referens, with its great grand-dam) it breeds, and soon after migrates for the second time to the sea. A sojourn there of a few weeks changes its name, size, and shape, and immigrating again into its native stream it becomes a salmon. To deserve that name it must have made two voyages to sea, and entered the third year or thereabouts of its existence. Afterwards, as long as it lives, it visits the sea annually, and annually revisits the streams of its birth, in which it gives birth to thousands of its tribe. Become an adult, the longer it remains at sea the more rapid is its growth. In fresh water it no longer thrives, and seems to seek the pure element for no other purpose than the important one of propagating its species. I have now in a very few lines traced the grand outlines of salmon life. I shall now confine myself to some minute details, omitting those that I do not think it necessary for the mere angler to know.

Mr. John Shaw of Drumlanrig, and Mr. A. Young of Sutherlandshire, the former the manager of the Duke of Buccleuch's salmon fisheries, the latter of those of the Duke of Sutherland, were the first to prove publicly some of the facts above

T