ducks frequented the spawning ford, and the superintendent bought one, and found its crop quite full of Salmon roe.  If this had been buried eighteen inches in the gravel (as Salmo Salar suggests), the duck would have had some difficulty in extracting it; but so far as my experience goes, it is not usually one-half that depth, although this varies in different rivers.  Then, if one Salmon is able to plough up gravel which is cemented together by sand and long continuance in one place, why should not another be able to do the same when the gravel is loose and easily removed?  But there is another enemy whom Salmo Salar has not mentioned, who does more harm than all the rest:  that is the poacher, and I fear that many of the Salmon which Salmo Salar saw spawning in the Hodder and its tributaries have since then made a journey overland.  At all events, I am credibly informed that in one season a gang of poachers took seventy Salmon in the Hodder.  Is he sure they have taken none this season?  Salmo Salar seems to think that one pair of Salmon will not spawn on the same ground, which has been previously occupied by another pair; but he has only to watch the same ridd for a week or two to be convinced he is mistaken.  As to fish refusing to spawn on new gravel, I may state that when Mr. Fawkes was making his experiments at Farnley he put some new gravel into his brook, and there were sixteen pairs of Trout spawning on it the next morning.  Salmo Salar says that if he can have those simple checks which he enumerates to the present practices, he will restore abundance of Salmon to the Ribble; they are all very good in their way, but do not go quite far enough, and they would do very little good without a fourth, namely, protection from the poacher for the fish on the spawning beds.  Until this can be given more efficiently than it is at present, all the rest will be unavailing; and until the upper proprietors can have a greater interest in the preservation of Salmon than they now have, they cannot be expected to give themselves much trouble on the subject.

My readers would not be much edified by strong assertion and counter-assertion of what Trout do, and what they cannot do; nor is it probable that where we differ we should convince each other; neither do I see any occasion for personality, when both parties are actuated by the same motives—­a desire to see the Salmon fisheries restored to a state of great prosperity.  I therefore avoid noticing some of Salmo Salar’s remarks, which seem to me a little tinged with this spirit, and hope we shall be able to act in concert for the attainment of that desirable result.  Salmo Salar will find that the number of Smolts is not always determined by the quantity of ova deposited:  if he will examine the bed of the Hodder the next low water, he will find many of the ridds disturbed by the ice floods of yesterday; and if he doubts this, I shall be happy to examine them along with him, if he will give me previous notice of his intention.