ng yachts.

I thought then, and have ever since, that the Golden Trout, fresh from
the water, is one of the most beautiful fish that swims. Unfortunately
it fades very quickly, and so specimens in alcohol can give no idea of
it. In fact, I doubt if you will ever be able to gain a very clear
idea of it unless you take to the trail that leads up, under the end of
which is known technically as the High Sierras.

The Golden Trout lives only in this one stream, but occurs there in
countless multitudes. Every little pool, depression, or riffles has
its school. When not alarmed they take the fly readily. One afternoon
I caught an even hundred in a little over an hour. By way of
parenthesis it may be well to state that most were returned unharmed to
the water. They run small,--a twelve-inch fish is a monster,--but are
of extraordinary delicacy for eating. We three devoured sixty-five
that first evening in camp.

Now the following considerations seem to me at this point worthy of
note. In the first place, the Golden Trout occurs but in this one
stream, and is easily caught. At present the stream is comparatively
inaccessible, so that the natural supply probably keeps even with the
season's catches. Still the trail is on the direct route to Mount
Whitney, and year by year the ascent of this "top of the Republic" is
becoming more the proper thing to do. Every camping party stops for a
try at the Golden Trout, and of course the fish-hog is a sure
occasional migrant. The cowboys told of two who caught six hundred in a
day. As the certainly increasing tide of summer immigration gains in
volume, the Golden Trout, in spite of his extraordinary numbers at
present, is going to be caught out.

Therefore, it seems the manifest duty of the Fisheries to provide for
the proper protection and distribution of this species, especially the
distribution. Hundreds of streams in the Sierras are without trout
simply because of some natural obstruction, such as a waterfall too
high to jump, which prevents their ascent of the current. These are
all well adapted to the planting of fish, and might just as well be
stocked by the Golden Trout as by the customary Rainbow. Care should be
taken lest the two species become hybridized, as has occurred following
certain misguided efforts in the South Fork of the Kern.

So far as I know but one attempt has been made to transplant these
fish. About five or six years ago a man named Grant carrie