He has been taken with a fly made of the red feathers of a
paroquet, a strange outlandish bird; and he will rise at a fly not unlike a
gnat, or a small moth, or, indeed, at most flies that are not too big. He is
a fish that lurks close all Winter, but is very pleasant and jolly after
mid-April, and in May, and in the hot months. He is of a very fine
shape, his flesh is white, his teeth, those little ones that he has, are in
his throat, yet he has so tender a mouth, that he is oftener lost after an
angler has hooked him than any other fish. Though there be many of
these fishes in the delicate river Dove, and in Trent, and some other
smaller rivers, as that which runs by Salisbury, yet he is not so general a
fish as the Trout, nor to me so good to eat or to angle for. And so I shall
take my leave of him: and now come to some observations of the
Salmon, and how to catch him.
The fourth day - continued
The Salmon
Chapter VII
Piscator
The Salmon is accounted the King of freshwater fish; and is ever bred
in rivers relating to the sea, yet so high. or far from it, as admits of no
tincture of salt, or brackishness. He is said to breed or cast his spawn, in
most rivers, in the month of August: some say, that then they dig a hole
or grave in a safe place in the gravel, and there place their eggs or
spawn, after the melter has done his natural office, and then hide it
most cunningly, and cover it over with gravel and stones; and then
leave it to their Creator's protection, who, by a gentle heat which he
infuses into that cold element, makes it brood, and beget life in the
spawn, and to become Samlets early in the spring next following.
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