that the fish were in best season from November to
March, whilst the evidence of the witnesses from other parts of
the kingdom goes to prove that this is the very worst period for
catching them.

One maintains that each river has its own variety of fish, which
can be distinguished from the fish of any other river; another
contends that there is no such difference; a third states that
stake nets are exceedingly injurious to the breed of the fish; and
a fourth attests that stake nets only catch the fish when they are
in the best season, that neither Kelt nor fry are taken in them,
and that if they were prohibited it would only be preserving the
fish for the grampuses and seals;--in short, the evidence
regarding both their habits, and the best mode of catching them,
having in view the preservation and increase of the breed, is so
completely contradictory as to leave a doubt in the mind of every
one who reads it, and has no other means of forming an opinion. I
will endeavour to show in some instances which of the testimonies
is correct, and it will be for my readers to judge how far I
succeed, and I hope they will be so obliging as to correct any
error into which I may fall.

First.--It is my opinion that the fry of Salmon are much older
when they leave the river than seems to be generally supposed, and
that the growth of this fish is by no means so rapid as it is
considered to be by those who have written upon the subject. For
several years previous to 1816 the Salmon were unable to ascend
into the upper parts of the river Wharfe, being prevented either
by the high weirs in the lower parts, or by some other cause, and
of course there were no Smolts or Par; but in that year either the
incessant rains of that summer or rumours of the formation of an
association for the protection of fish, or some other unknown
cause, enabled some Salmon to ascend the river, thirty or forty
miles, and to spawn there. In the next spring, 1817, there were no
Smolts, but about September they began to rise at the very small
flies which the anglers use in that river--they were then a little
larger than Minnows. In the spring of 1818 there were blue Smolts,
or what are generally known as Salmon fry, which went down to the
sea in the May of that year; but these were only part of the
brood, the females only, the males remaining all that summer,
being at the period when the females went down very much smaller
than they, and what was called at the