both rod and reel are managed, after the glittering lounge, or great up-heaving swell of sullen waters, followed by a whir of line like an electric telegraph, has proved the hooking of some goodly fish, which, under the guidance of a master's hand, may rush and spring and flounder all in vain; but alas! in timid and unsteady tyro's keeping, rises like a silvery meteor, and instantaneously turning its head one way and its tail another, snaps the line with one indignant plunge, "A moment white, then gone for ever." But although a man who "spareth the rod," can never efficiently instruct himself or others in its practice, we do not mean to say that there is the slightest harm either in reading or in writing books on angling. On the contrary, as many respectable followers of the aquatic art are frequently and unfortunately laid up by rheumatism, the custom of reading a good deal, and writing a very little, may even be deemed advisable in certain cases- that is, where there is a remnant of reason, a remembrance of the first rules of grammar, some slight power of observation, discrimination, and expression, and a resolute resolve, while indulging in such works, never to lose temper as well as time, through the folly there abounding. · The germ or nucleus of Mr. Stoddart's present publication, is no doubt his small precursor entitled The Art of Angling, as practised in Scotland,' published so far back as 1835. We desire to refer for a moment to that former work, in order to give the author credit for his sound doctrine on the great parr question, even at that early period, when we confess our own mind was greatly darkened. He was of course quite ignorant, in common with all his brethren of the angle, of Mr. Shaw's original discovery of the slow progress of that fish's growth in fresh water, and of the consequent length of time during which it sojourned there; and, indeed, as respects this latter point, his views are somewhat vague and misty, if not altogether inaccurate, even now. But that he, with a wise and discriminating instinct, felt, although he could not scientifically prove, that parr were young salmon, is, we think, apparent from the following paragraphs: "Three theories, barring the one of its being a distinct species, are abroad concerning the parr. The first and most general opinion is, that the parr belongs both to the trout and salmon species, and is a sort of mule betwixt them; the second theory maintained by some, reckons it to be the male of the sea-trout, whitling, or finnock; and the third, which is by far the soundest, is held, certainly, we confess, upon suspicious premises, by the Ettrick Shepherd, "Nor is our hypothesis altogether imaginary, for we come to the relation of a circumstance, the happening of which grounded cur belief in this theory; and no assailable one it is, if our Last eyes, which are good, did not deceive us. spring, after the time when sinoults generally descend, we chanced to capture a few of them in St. Mary's Loch, the streams about which are a favorite breeding-place for salmon. These were of a large kind, and had been prevented from joining the spring shoals, by their inability to discover the outlet to the lake; they were soft and loose in the scale, but seemingly an enticing bait for pike, which-frequent a smaller sheet of water immediately above St. Mary's. In the afternoon, happening to use one of these smoults on our pike tackle, we remarked how its scales came off in great numbers, discovering beneath a perfect parr, not to be mistaken in any one confirmed by repeated experiments, and are now respect. This incidental discovery we further convinced beyond a doubt of the fact, that parr are the young of the salmon in a certain state. "Nor have we availed ourselves in the minutest degree of the observations of our friend the Ettrick Shepherd, in the Agricultural Journal; for we esteein his method of proof as somewhat fallacious, and at war with the established doctrine of chances; yet we have conversed with those who have asserted the accuracy of Mr. Hogg's statement, and we know it to be the constant practice of the bard of Altrive to mark the tail-fin of his parr with a peculiar incision, not difficult to recognise. We confess, however, that it is wonderful, first, that Mr. Hogg should be able to catch the ten thousandth portion of the parr frequenting Yarrow; second, that out of a few hundreds that he might catch and mutilate, such a number should reach the sea, undergo the many chances of disaster on their way thither, the more hideous perils of that element: that they should ascend to the exact stream of their birth, in preference to many others; and that when of good size and liable to be taken on ever so many occasions by human means, they should, escaping net and hook, otter and leister, arrive uninjured at Mr. Hogg's feet, and allow him to transfix them through and through, in order to discover their personal identity."— p. 86. The most painful part of the discovery of the true character and status of the parr, is the fearful consequences which may now ensue to the youthful progeny of the human race. Although regarding all our mighty rivers and their lesser there has been no legislative enactment concerning parr, under that particular and appropriate name, yet the ascertainment of their being young salmon, brings them into the same category with that noble fish, and places them beneath the shelter of its shield and buckler. From this it follows, that if the Act be strictly enforced and followed out, all youthful anglers (and anglers indeed of every age, but we most compassionate the young) must, in all rivers haunted by salmon, be totally debarred the pleasure of the rod, or use it at their peril, under the risk of conviction and heavy fine; because, as in most rivers, the majority of small trout, commonly so called, are actually parr or young salmon, it is impossible to angle, in however good faith, for genuine trout, without killing also genuine salmon; and so the son of a respectable attorney (we suppose there are such people), who encreels, inter alia, and inadvertently, a few innocent parr, as yet unconscious even of incipient greatness, "shall forfeit and pay any sum not less than one pound sterling, and not exceeding ten pounds," besides forfeiting his rod or "other engine," whatever that may be. There is something most considerate and very soothing in the "not exceeding" termination of the clause, as exhibiting, under the very aggravated and heinous nature of the crime supposed, an almost heroic limitation of punishment. Mr. Stoddart's present volume is so much more comprehensive and complete than his former one, that it may fairly be regarded altogether as a new and different work, and certainly one of the best and most important of its kind which has hitherto issued from the press. The author has been long and favorably known to both the angling and the literary world as an experienced sportsman and agreeable writer. Devoted to his art from early youth, a more recent residence of ten continuous years on Tweedside, in the neighbourhood of Kelso, with the further experience of two seasons by the banks of salmon streams in the north of Scotland, has given him a large measure of acquaintance with the subject, and most ample opportunities both of special practice and general observation of things connected with his favorite art, since he first indited his Scottish Angler,' in 1835. His Angler's Companion of 1847, will therefore be found to be the most complete compendium of thing snew and old, and worthy of remembrance, which we possess upon the subject at the present time. He not only discusses the theory and practice of the art, with special directions in relation to fly and bait fishing for the principal species which occur in Scotland, but he also gives separate chapters containing local details streams, extremely valuable as contributions to our general knowledge, and not only useful, but indispensable, as itineraries to guide the angler in his watery way. The very "contents" of these chapters are enough to make any man discontented both with time and space, during the present wintry weather, when he must endure himself and family by the fire-side. The Tweed, the Forth, the Tay, and of each of these the tributaries-themselves a world of waters infinite; the "rivers of Argus and Aberdeenshire;" the "rivers of the Moray Firth;" "the Beauly and Conan;" the "rivers of the Dornoch Firth;" the "Oikel, Cassley, Carron, and Shin, Loch Shin, Loch Craggie," and many more; the "Naver and Strathy, the Hope, Dinart, and Borgie, Loch Stack, the Laxford, the Inchard, the Lochs of Assynt, the river Ewe, Loch Maree, the Lewis;" then "the Awe, and rivers and lochs of Argyleshire;" "the Clyde and streams of the southwest," and "the rivers of the Solway Firth.” "Fate, drop the curtain, we can stand no more." Mr. Stoddart's first chapter is occupied by his views regarding the river-trout, its character and habits; and contains many sound aud sensible observations, along with certain statements of things which are hard to be understood. But of these anon. "The trout is unquestionably a voracious feeder. It consumes, in proportion to its size, a greater quantity of sustenance than any other fresh-water fish; nor, in respect to the quality of its food, is it quite so scrupulous as is generally imagined. Look, for instance, at the variety it indulges in, according as the seasons, hours of the day, and state of the water or atmosphere, prompt and direct it. In this variety are embraced the whole of the insect tribes, winged or otherwise; frogs, leeches, worms, slugs, snails, maggots, cad-bait, every sort and size of fly, beetle, and moth, the water-spider, &c. Then there are fish-the smaller ones of its own species, parr or fingerlings, minnows, loaches, and sticklebacks, along with the roe or ova of salmon; and I doubt not even young birds and water-rats are occasionally made prey of by hungry river-trout. Examine the stomach, and you will generally find a large mass composed of insect-remains in a partly digested state, and superadded sometimes to these the remnants of a parr, loach, or minnow. The carp, the tench, the pike, are not more varied in their feeding than the common fresh-water trout. Even the pike itself, although a fearless, vindictive, and rapacious fish, is less gluttonous in its habits, and in its tastes infinitely more simple and con gruous. "What is it, then, it may be asked, that renders the trout difficult of capture? Its greedy propensities, one might imagine, would naturally cent Newfoundland dogs, with lofty foreheads and thoughtful deep-set eyes- such as Landseer would love to paint—and tails that would turn round a man-of-war even during ebb-tide, with a single swinge. But that a variety of food is conductive to the exuberant growth both of man and the lower creatures is certain. allow little room to the angler for the exercise of skill and judgment. But experience has taught otherwise; and the simple reason of this is, that with these propensities the trout unites epicure habits, caprice in its hours and seasons of feeding, cunning, shyness, and watchful distrust. As an epicure, it battens one day upon surface or winged food, and the next upon ground sustenance. Sometimes the minnow will attract it, sometimes the worm; sometimes, turning from both with dislike or satiety, it will amuse its palate with delicacies of the minutest description the larvæ of water insects, or pellets of ova, picked up with address and assiduity from among the interstices of rocks and stones, from the foliage or roots of water-plants, or while floating past it in the descending current. And this caprice as to its food, while it tests the skill and experience of the angler, is assisted in doing "properties not always possessed by the deso by the cunning and natural mistrust of the scription of trout I am alluding to, which, as fish; its quick, vigilant eye, its keen, distinguish- overgrown individuals of their species, are ining sense of smell, and similar instinctive endow-clined to show a monster front, big bony jaws, a ments and perceptions."—p. 13. These omnivorous propensities no doubt form the ground-work of its too often fatal affection, even for those fantastic artificial lures which anglers fondly call flies, because they sometimes in a certain small measure resemble these insects, and are made by impulsion of rod and line to wing their adventurous way, first through the air and then through the water, where assuredly they soon lose all resemblance to the things whose name they bear. The size to which trout attain, and the rate of their increase of growth, depend greatly upon circumstances, and vary with the nature of particular localities. An extensive range of ground, with an abundant supply of good food, makes speedy amends for want of years; while on the other hand, if a trout is planted in a spring well, although it be fed, even by the fairest hands, by night and day, its increase of dimensions will be slow and slight. This is probably owing to the want of diversity of aliment, and which debars the fish from choosing its food in accordance with what some might call caprice, but which we shall simply name the natural inclination of the moment. It is said that if you feed a human being upon pigeon pies for six weeks, he either dies or becomes a maniac. We never chanced to try the experiment either on ourselves or others, and would certainly, in the present state of the money market, rather decline the hazard of a contract to pay the expense of pie and paste to more than an extremely limited number of Irish navies who might survive the trial-certainly more humane in itself than the administering of even infinitesimal quantities of arsenic, corrosive sublimate, prussic acid, or other poisonous and therefore rather unpleasant preparations (as is the practice of physiologists), to magnifi While at Fort-Augustus, in July, 1835, Mr. Stoddart saw what he considered a loch-trout of the common kind captured from a boat by trolling-tackle in Loch Ness, which weighed fourteen pounds. He states, that in point of shape it was, to his eye, symmetrically faultless, being deep in the flank, small-headed, and beautifully curved in the back and shoulder: long, straight, thick-hided hull, and a huge flapping tail; in fact, all the characteristics which age, hunger, and roving habits are apt to engender."-p. 19. We are inclined to think that river trout, although their average size is certainly less than that of the loch variety, exhibit the largest examples of their kind, if we exclude Salmo ferox as probably a different species. For example, Stephen Oliver the younger, records a trout taken in September, 1832, near Great Driffield, which measured thirty-one inches in length, twenty-one in girth, and weighed seventeen pounds. A few years since, as mentioned by Mr. Yarrell, a notice was sent to the Linnean Society of a trout that was caught on the 11th of January, 1822, in a small branch of the Avon, "at the back of Castle-street, Salisbury," which weighed twenty-five pounds, and the accurate Ichthyologist just named, has given us instances of Thames trout weighing from eleven to fifteen pounds. "Some deep pools." says Mr. Yarrell, "in the Thames above Oxford, afford excellent trout, and some of them of very large size. I have before me a record of six, taken by minnowspinning, which weighed together fifty-four pounds, the largest of them thirteen pounds. Few persons are aware of the difficulty of taking a trout when it has attained twelve or fourteen pounds weight, and it is very seldom that one of this size is hooked and landed, except by a firstdition, is considered a present worthy a place at rate fisherman; such a fish, when in good cona royal table." We believe, that the English or south country anglers are great adepts in long light casts, with delicate gear, in deep still waters, where finely deceptive fishing is required, so that a Quarterly Reviewer might possibly excel another of the North British, in that quiet though skilful mode | rollicking paupers, weighing fifteen stone and of capturing the finny race; but in or near a roaring rock-bound river, where the stream is almost a cataract, and the pool apparently a boiling cauldron, though extremely cold, we should by no means fear to back the true Presbyterian blue against the equally true Episcopalian brown. We have no personal knowledge of any very large river-trout in Scotland, having never killed one quite three pounds; but we see no reason to dissent from Mr. Stoddart in his statement, as to the probability of individuals, purely of the river sort, attaining to the weight of ten or twelve. In the Aberdeen Journal,' September, 1833, mention is made of a trout killed in the Don, which weighed eleven pounds, and measured in girth seventeen inches. They are frequently captured in the Tweed by means of cairnnets, and otherwise, weighing upwards of six pounds. Mr. Stoddart has taken them in that river, and its tributary Teviot, as heavy as four pounds and a half. But we believe that the slow and stately streams of England, in its southern quarters, with their richer feeding-ground, and more umbrageous places of repose and shelter, produce larger trout than any that are frequent in the more translucent rivers of the north. The rate at which trouts grow, and the time they take to attain the adult state, are points of some importance in their history, which it is, however, fully more easy to imagine than to describe. Mr. Stoddart is of opinion, that if well fed they grow with astonishing rapidity, and that under any circumstances not absolutely hostile to their existence, they acquire, in the course of four or five months, dimensions which entitle them to a "place in the angler's creel." We fear that many are placed there with very small pretensions as to size, though excellent when "lisping in numbers" in the frying-pan, with a considerable coating of meal. Their spawn is shed, like that of the salmon, during a range of several months, from the end of September onwards; and in like manner the period of hatching depends on the conditions of the weather, a mild season producing young in earlier spring than a severe one. No man can tell the age of a trout simply by looking at its teeth, and in this respect, as doubtless in many others, it differs from a horse. There is no doubt that the size and character of trouts must depend mainly on the quantity and quality of food. There are numerous naturally impoverished streams where it is scarcely possible to capture a trout above a quarter of a pound, and the greater the number of them, the more lank and ill-conditioned they become. One might as soon expect to find jolly red-faced upwards, in a poors' house, as well-conditioned fish in such ill-supplied waters. It is thus that many of our Highland and northern rivers, flowing as they do through barren and uncultivated districts, with rocky unretentive beds, their waters clear and cold, containing no sedimentary deposits, and surrounded by no umbrageous banks nor varied vegetation, "the flowery lap of some irriguous valley," produce only lean and dwarfish trouts. A different rule holds in respect to salmon, because of these the feeding-grounds are in the sea, and a roaring and outrageous river is all to their taste, as food is not their object in seeking the fresh water, but a stream or current as an essential attribute of the spawning ground. Of course they do feed in rivers, and fortunately for ourselves, not seldom on artificial flies (we wonder what peculiar kind they take them for), but they do not increase in size or weight, and greatly deteriorate in general condition. Mr. Stoddart in his second chapter, expatiates on the materials of the angler's art, on gut, casting lines, knots, rods, reels, hooks, boots, pocketbooks, boxes, gaffs, and panniers. But he says less than he ought to do regarding sandwiches and hard-boiled eggs. We cannot trust ourselves with the discussion at this time, either of the many points on which he enters, or the few he has omitted, but must refer our readers to the work itself. A word or two meanwhile regarding gut, and the dyeing of the same. A man may as well go unarmed into battle, or with merely a switch in his hand, as approach a river worth wading into when his guts are not in good order. This precious and indispensable material is fabricated from the entrails of the silk-worm, chiefly in Spain, Portugal, Italy, Sicily, and the "Isles of Greece," and almost exclusively for the British market. The Spanish is the best, either from its being constitutionally finer, or more carefully prepared. The Sicilian is of great length, but it is of a coarser fabric, and is deficient in roundness and equality of texture. Gut, to be really good, must be round and equal in the thread, not lacteous but transparent, and free from film within, or flossy fibres outside. The most desirable to possess, and therefore, as generally happens, the most difficult to obtain, is the finer kind for trout-fishing, and the stronger sort for salmon. The intermediate grades may be picked up anywhere at small expense. In regard to the color of gut, Mr. Stoddart is of opinion, " from experiments made by himself at various times," that it is advantageous for the angler to employ stained or dyed gut, in preference to the material in its natural state. He has ascertained also, that there are two colors, or rather tints, that take the precedence over all others in producing the desired effect; that is, concealing it from the vision of trout or salmon, as well as from the observation of the looker on. "With regard to the experiments in question, they were made, some at the bridge below Coldstream, and others at Teviot Bridge, near Kelso, a party on each occasion being stationed to report on the key-stone of one of the arches, and immediately superintending the cast underneath. The conclusion I have come to is, that the walnut leaf, or brown dye, is best calculated for the purpose required; although, in a bright day, and in clear water, a bluish or neutral tinge is perhaps the most desirable.” — p. 40.. Now the question here comes to be, What is "the purpose required?" Is it to deceive the trout, or only the superintendent? If the latter, it is clear that the color which most resembles the bed of the river, if the water is shallow, or the color of the water itself if it is deep, will prove the most deceptive; and the superintendent, if trusting to his sense of sight alone, will be truly astonished to see large trout dragged ashore by means merely of a rod and fly, the connecting link, or at least that portion of it commonly called the gut line, having "resolved itself into a dew," through the instrumentality of walnut juice. But if the object is to deceive the fish, which are by no means upon the keystone of any of the arches, but in the waters beneath, and who see the line, it may be, under various aspects, but certainly most frequently as an object above them, interposed as a slender streak between themselves and the light of heaven, then is not the question of translucence rather than of color to be kept in mind, and our decision consequently determined in favor rather of whatever intercepts least light from the eye of the fish, than of what may appear least glaring to the vision of the man? The structure of the eye in man and fish is very dissimilar, and it is perhaps not quite fair to expect the one to achieve at once what the other has long been accustomed to; but we are certainly of opinion that it was the duty of the superintendent, if he was really in earnest in his business, to demit his super-intendence altogether, and, descending from the key-stone of the arch, betake himself to the bed of the river, and there ascertain what aspect his variously-tinted guts assumed when he himself was under water, in his proper capacity of a sub-aqueous-intendent. He must consent to place himself in the position of a fish, or as near it as he can, before he may reasonably hope to see things as a fish sees them. As to the point in question, we presume, that as clear and colorless gut is likely to prove the most translucent and least interceptive, it is likely also to prove the most wily and least observable. The false mode now noticed, of testing the perceptive powers of fishes by the results of our own senses, is in truth an error which pervades the very foundations of the art of angling. It lies at the bottom of all the false reasoning by which the theory of imitation of the natural fly is still maintained a theory which of course supposes, in the first place, that an artificial fly is really quite like some natural one, even when the two are exhibited side by side; and not only so, but, secondly, that the same artificial fly, when diving furiously among the roaring waters, ascending against the current more frequently than it is descending with it, and crossing and re-crossing the running stream at right angles, and in all other directions, with the greatest rapidity, the most perfect ease, and completest self-command, still appears to trout or salmon to be identical in kind with any poor drowning musca, of whatever sort, which may have fallen into the "hell of waters," and is there instantaneously swept downwards and away for ever. Try the thing any fine day, by the side of some fair and flowing river. Pitch an actual fly of any kind into the current, and take notice whether its aspect or procedure resembles that of the artificial fly when worked by an angler who knows his trade, and is both able and willing to raise a fish. If the two objects in question do not present the same appearance, character, or mode of action, in a single feature, to the eye of any reasonable man, is it to be supposed that any fish will be found so unreasonable as to insist on detecting resemblances where none exist, and so foolish as to swallow, or attempt to swallow, an artificial fly in the afternoon, merely because it seems to it to be precisely the same as the natural insect which it had successfully swallowed in the morning? We have far too good an opinion of fish in general to suppose any such thing. As two sets of opinions, somewhat dissimilar if not discordant, seem still afloat upon this subject, we may here discuss them briefly, although in reality they lead rather to a theoretical than a practical difference as respects the angler. The older, and it may be still-prevailing idea regarding artificial flies was this, that they required to be made in precise and specific imitation of certain living species, each of the many hundreds in common use exactly resembling one in nature (it was alleged), and that the angler's success in his art resulted from the perfection of that resemblance, the fish being so misled by it as to mistake the one for the other. Hence has |