44 THE MAMMALS, REPTILES, AND FISHES OF ESSEX.
appearance may be accounted for, not by the increased value
of the coarse fish upon which it subsists, so much as the
comparative ease with which it may be taken in a steel trap,
and ultimately converted into a " specimen" to adorn the
hall wall—a horrible " stuffed " effigy of its former graceful
self. One cannot sufficiently regret the constantly-recurring
notices in the public prints of Otters having been shot. Yet
these notices prove that the animal is now to be found all
over the county, and the very frequency of the announce-
ments shows it to be present in greater numbers than at
one time. It is possible that it is not now diminishing in
number, for the capture of Otters is reported not only from
the rivers but also from the reeds and sedges of the marshes,
where they had not been seen for years. In the Stour,
Chelmer, Blackwater, and Lea, Otters occur frequently.
The Rev. W. B. Daniel in his Rural Sports (1812, vol. i., p.
620) says that a gigantic Otter, weighing upwards of forty
pounds, was snared in October, 1794, in the River Lea,
between Ware and Hertford. He also mentions (op. cit.,
p. 631) nine killed in one day in the frozen " fleets " of Fobbing
Marshes. Mr. Arthur Fitch, of Wixoe, shot two females in
the Stour on 24th December, 1888 ; and Mr. E. A. Fitch
reports (Essex Nat., vol. i., p. 105) quite a number from the
neighbourhood of Maldon, both in the Chelmer and Black-
water rivers. Others at Rayne, Sturmer, and Baythorne End
are also noted (ibid, 280).
Mr. French relates that a mother and two young Otters
were taken alive in the Chelmer at Felstead, in February
1891. They were returned to the river (ibid, vol. v., p. 73).
In August 1891, a young female was caught alive in the
Tendring Hall Brook, and was forwarded to the Zoological
Gardens (Essex County Chronicle, August 14th, 1891). At the
end of the following November (ibid, Dec. 4th), a male Otter,