years and a half old-very good for the table. I will land him if possible.

HAL.-This happens often with grayling: their mouths are tender, and unless the hook catches in the upper lip, which is rather thick, it is more than an equal chance that he escapes you.

PHYS.-Here, I have another, that has taken the stretcher, which being a larger hook, I hope he may be held. He is likewise a larger fish-but how oddly he spins! This, I suppose, must be owing to his large back fin, by which the stream carries him

round. There he is: he has quite twisted my link; it would not be amiss to have swivels for this kind of fishing.

HAL.-It is a fish in good season,-dark above, fair below, and weighs, I should suppose, about 1lb.

PHYS. As this is the first grayling I have seen of my own taking, I must measure, weigh, and examine him.

HAL.-We can do this hereafter. See, our fish barrel; he can be kept alive till a more convenient time of the day.

PHYS.-I am disposed to gratify my curiosity immediately; and I think to acquire

information is at least as interesting as catching fish. I shall kill him by a blow on the head. He, I suppose, is not worth crimping afterwards?

HAL. Certainly not, at this time; and this is not necessary with a fish of this size, which ought to be fried; but if we catch a large grayling, approaching to 2lbs. he shall be killed, crimped, and boiled, like our Denham trout; you will then find him excellent, and not inferior, in my thinking, to the best perch-more like the most exquisitely tasted of all our fish, the red mullet.

PHYS.-Out of the water, this is a handsome fish, broader round the middle, and more hog-backed than the trout, but gracefully tapering towards the tail. The belly I see is silvery with yellow, and the pectoral, ventral and anal fins are almost goldcoloured; the back gray with small black spots, and the back fin beautifully coloured bright purple, with black and blue spots. It has likewise an agreeable odour; so that both from its colour and smell it does not seem undeserving the title given it by St.

Ambrose, of the flower of fishes. It measures, I find, 14 inches in length; in girth 74. It has 10 spines in the pectoral fin, 23 in the dorsal, 16 in the ventral, 14 in the anal, and 18 in the caudal.

HAL.--Now for its anatomy. Its stomach is very thick, not unlike that of a char or gillaroo trout, and contains flies, gravel, and larvæ, with their cases. The liver and bowels do not differ much from those of a trout; and the ovaria or roe, with eggs as large as mustard seed, are on each side the air bladder. Though a thicker fish, the grayling does not weigh much more than the trout in proportion to his length: the greater breadth of back is compensated by the more rapid tapering of tail, and a trout in very high season will sometimes equal in weight a grayling of the same length. The ova in this fish, and in the species generally, are very small at this time of the year; but in the beginning of April, the season of their spawning, they become nearly as large as the ova of the trout-of the size of

peppercorns. But I see, Poietes, your rod is in

N

order and there are many fish rising in this large deep pool, some of which are large grayling. The blue dun is on in quantity, and there is both cloud and wind, which half an hour ago we had no right to expect. Let me advise you to use three flies of different shades of the dun: the stretcher, a pale blue with yellow body; the first dropper, a winged fly with dun body; and the third, a similar fly with dark body. There, you see; he rose and refused stretcher -and again he has a second time refused it. I think the colour of the dubbing is too bright: try a winged fly for the stretcher with a greenish body. Good-he has taken it, and ought to be a large fish. Now we have him: he is at least sixteen inches long, and in good season. Ornither, I advise you to use the same kind of fly, and to put up your tackle precisely in the same way as Poietes has done.

your

POIET.-How well they rise! At that moment I had two on my line: one of them is gone, but I hope I shall land the other.:

HAL.-Fish with activity while the cloud