Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIV.djvu/591

This page needs to be proofread.

SALMASIUS SALMON 567 but in reality, probably, on account of his opposition to the aristocratic party. In 47 he was prsetor, and in 46 he accompanied Caesar in his expedition to Africa. He was appointed governor of Numidia, and, after acquiring an immense fortune by plundering the inhabitants, devoted the remainder of his life to literary pursuits and the embellishment of his splendid gardens on the Quirinal hill. Dion Cassius and other authors ascribe to him almost every species of profligacy and crime. He wrote Bellum Catilinarium, a history of the conspiracy of Catiline ; Bellum Jugurthi- num, a history of the war against Jugurtha; and Historiarum Libri F., comprising the period between 78 B. C., the year of Sulla's death, and 66, and forming, with the other two works, a connected history of Roman affairs for 45 years. The last exists only in a few fragments. Of the numerous editions of the "Jugurthine War" and the "Conspiracy of Catiline," the first is that of Venice (fol., 1470), and one of the best that of Gerlach (3 vols. 4to, Basel, 1823-'31), the latter con- taining, in addition, the fragments of the lost books. There are numerous translations of Sallust into English, the oldest by Barclay (1511), and recent ones by Watson (1852), by Dr. Giles (1862), and by J. E. Mongan (1864). SALMASHS, Claudius (CLAUDE DE SAUMAISE), a French scholar, born at Semur-en-Auxois, April 15, 1588, died in Spa, Sept. 6, 1653. In Lis boyhood he wrote Greek and Latin verses. He completed his studies in Paris and Heidel- berg, and became a Protestant. He was in- vited to Venice, Oxford, and Borne, but pre- ferred in 1632 the university of Leyden, and returned there in 1640 after a visit to Paris, although offered a large pension if he would become Richelieu's biographer. At the insti- gation of Charles II., then a refugee in Hol- land, he wrote in 1649 Defemio Regia pro Ca- rolo Primo, which led to Milton's cetebrated reply, Pro Populo Anglicano Defensio (1650). In the same year he visited Queen Christina of Sweden, but returned in 1651 to Leyden. His most important work is Plinianm Exerci- tationes in Solinum (2 vols. fol., Paris, 1629; new ed., Utrecht, 1689). SALMON, the common name of the soft-rayed fishes of the genus aalmo (Guv.). The old genus salmo of Artedi and Linnaeus has been subdivided into the three principal families of salmonidce, characini, and scopelidce, of which only the first concerns us here; this, besides the salmon and trout, includes the smelt, cape- lin (mallotus), grayling, whitefish, and others. The genus salmo has the cheeks or whole head covered with scaleless integument, and the rest of the body with cycloid, thin, small scales; there is an adipose fin on the back near the tail, over the anal, and the dorsal is over the ventrals; the branchiostegal rays vary from 12 to 19, and there is a false gill on the inner side of the operculum ; the edge of the upper jaw is formed by the maxillaries as well as the premaxillaries ; the air bladder is always present, large and simple, opening into the pha- rynx; the intestinal canal is short, with nu- merous pyloric caeca; the ovaries form closed sacs without oviducts, and the eggs enter the cavity of the abdomen, whence they pass out by an opening behind the anus. The names salmon and trout have been applied in the most indefinite and contrary manner, by dif- ferent authors and in both hemispheres, to the fishes of this genus ; those by almost universal consent called salmon will be alluded to here, leaving for the article TROUT the brighter spotted and usually smaller and fresh-water species. According to Prof. Rasch of Nor- way, many so-called species of the salmonidcs produce fertile offspring inter se; the spawn of the true salmon fecundated by the common trout has been known to produce 40 per cent, of a well shaped prolific brood ; showing either that hybrids are not sterile, or that the limits of the species cannot be defined. Even the genus as restricted by Cuvier has been sub- divided into three by Valenciennes according to the distribution of the vomerine teeth ; in salmo (Val.) there are strong conical teeth in both jaws and a small group at the end of the vomer; the palate bones and the sides of the tongue are also armed with teeth ; in fario (Val.), including the salmon trout, there is in addition a single mesial line of teeth on the vomer; and in solar (Val.) the vomer has two rows of teeth. Species called salmon and spe- cies called trout are found in each of these subdivisions, but the last two contain chiefly those called salmon trout and trout. The sal- mons are of great importance to man as an article of food, and are the most esteemed of any fresh- water fish ; the number of men and the amount of capital employed in this fishery are very great ; their flesh is eaten fresh, salt- ed, smoked, dried, and pickled. The species, which are numerous, inhabit the sea and fresh waters, some migrating from the ocean to rivers at the breeding season; they spawn in shallow streams, both sexes assisting in form- ing the bed; they are found in the northern waters of Europe, Asia, and America, even in small streams, in the cold water of the arctic zone, and as high as the regions of perpetual snow ; none have been found in South Amer- ica, the East Indies, or Africa. They are un- mistakably alluded to by Pliny and Ausonius. At the head of the true salmons, or those having the body of the vomer smooth, stands the common salmon (& salmo, Val. ; S. talar of authors). In this the head is large, the gape wide and well furnished with teeth ; the gill openings are very large, and consequently death very soon takes place out of the water ; the abdominal outline is much more curved than the dorsal; the snout pointed, and the body rather slender and fusiform ; the form is elegant, and the movements are rapid aad vig- orous. The color is slaty blue on the back, darkest on the head, duller and slightly silvery