During the winter the parent fishes of the Atlantic salmon, which used to be exceedingly numerous in all our northern rivers emptying into the Atlantic, and still haunt the rivers of Northeastern Canada, and of Scotland, make their way as far up a clear and gravelly river as they possibly can, till they find a suitable place in which to lay their eggs. The mother then scoops a hole at the bottom of the stream, in which she deposits her eggs in batches, carefully covering up each batch as she does so. At this time both parents are in very poor condition, and the males are known to anglers as "kelts." For a time they remain in the river, feeding ravenously. Then in March or April they travel down the river and pass into the sea, where they stay for three or four months, after which they ascend the river again, as before. Meanwhile the eggs remain buried in the gravel for about four months. At the end of that time the little fishes hatch out, and immediately hide themselves for about a fortnight under a rock or a large stone. You would never know what they were if you were to see them, for they look much more like tadpoles than fishes; and each has a little bag of nourishment underneath its body on which it lives. When this is exhausted they leave their retreat and feed upon small insects, growing very rapidly, until in about a month's time they are four inches long. They are now called parr and have a row of dark stripes upon their sides, and in this condition they remain for at least a year. Their color then changes, the stripes disappearing, and the whole body becoming covered with bright silvery scales. The little fishes are now known as smolts, and, like their parents; they make their way down the river and pass into the sea. There they remain until the autumn, when they ascend the river again. By this time they have grown considerably, weighing perhaps five or six pounds, and are called grilse. And it is not until they have visited the sea again in the following year that they are termed salmon. When salmon are ascending a river and come to a waterfall, they climb it by leaping into the air and so springing into the stream above the fall, trying over and over again until they succeed. When the fall is too high to be climbed in this way, the owners of the river often make a kind of water staircase by the side of it, so that the fishes can leap up one stair at a time. This is called a salmon-ladder. NORTH PACIFIC SALMON