The Lake Trout, or Mackinac Salmon, is the largest of the family of Salmonidoe, growing, it is said, sometimes to the weight of one hundred pounds.  From twenty to thirty pounds is not uncommon, which is much larger than the average of Salmo Salar, the true salmon.  Truth compels us to add, however, that our salmon of the Lakes is inferior to his kinsman of the salt water; though, as in the case of the white-fish, he has been slandered by ignorant people, such as newspaper letter-writers, and the like.  When taken from the clear, cold waters of Lake Huron or the Straits, and boiled as nearly alive as humanity will permit, Salmo Namaycush is nearly equal to the true salmon; but after two or three days in ice, “how stale, flat, and unprofitable!”

The Muskelunge (Esox Estor) is peculiar to this basin, and is the largest of the pickerels, weighing from ten to eighty pounds.  It is a very handsome and game fish, and is the king, or tyrant, of the water, devouring without mercy everything smaller than itself; though its favorite food is the white-fish, which, perhaps, accounts for the superior flavor of this huge pike, which is one of the very best of fresh-water fishes.

Another excellent fish for the table is the Pike-Perch, (Lucio-Perca) or Glass-Eyed Pike, from his large, brilliant eyes.  In Ohio, it is called the salmon, and by the Canadians the pickerel, while, with singular perversity, they persist in calling our pickerel a pike.  It is a very firm, well-flavored fish, weighing from two to ten pounds, and is found in all the Great Lakes.

Professor Agassiz was the first to describe a large and valuable species of pike, which he found in Lake Superior,—­the Northern Pike (Esox Boreus).  This is the most common species of pike in the St. Lawrence basin, though usually confounded with the common pickerel (Esox Reticulatus).  It grows to the size of fifteen or twenty pounds, and is a better table-fish than Esox Reticulatus.  It may be distinguished by the rows of spots sides, of a lighter color than the ground upon which they are arranged.  It differs from the Muskelunge in having the lower jaw full of teeth; whereas in the Muskelunge the anterior half of the lower jaw is toothless.

All the streams which empty into Lake Superior, those of the north shore of Lake Huron, the west shore of Lake Michigan as far as Lake Winnebago, and all the streams of Lake Ontario, contain the Speckled Trout (Salmo Fontinalis); while they are not found in the streams on the southern coasts of Lake Michigan, or (so far as we know) in the streams of Lake Erie.  What can determine this limitation of the range of the species?  It cannot be latitude, since trout are found in Pennsylvania and Virginia.  It is not longitude, since they occur in the head-waters of the Iowa rivers.  So Professor Agassiz found that Lake Superior contained species which were not to be found in the other lakes, and that the other lakes, again, contained species which did not occur in Lake Superior.  He says, in his work on Lake Superior,