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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 43874 ***
+
+DEDICATED
+
+TO
+
+THE LADY KATHERINE HARDY.
+
+[Illustration: A WOODLAND STREAM.]
+
+
+
+
+CHATS ON ANGLING.
+
+    BY
+
+    CAPTAIN H. V. HART-DAVIS,
+    Author of "Stalking Sketches."
+
+    WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY THE AUTHOR.
+
+    LONDON:
+    HORACE COX,
+    WINDSOR HOUSE, BREAM'S BUILDINGS, E.C.
+
+    1906.
+
+
+  LONDON:
+
+  PRINTED BY HORACE COX, WINDSOR HOUSE, BREAM'S BUILDINGS, E.C.
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+    A WOODLAND STREAM                _Frontispiece._
+    WAITING FOR A RISE          _Facing page_     5
+    BRINGING HIM DOWN TO THE NET         "       25
+    THE SEDGE HOUR                       "       35
+    A DRY FLY DAY ON LOCH ARD            "       47
+    LUNCHEON                             "       61
+    NEARING THE END                      "       72
+    GET THE GAFF READY                   "       79
+    HE MEANS GOING DOWN                  "       88
+    THE FALL'S POOL                      "      101
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+    INTRODUCTORY                            _page_    1
+
+    CHAPTER I.
+    IN PRAISE OF THE DRY FLY                   "      3
+
+    CHAPTER II.
+    DRY FLY TACKLE AND EQUIPMENT               "      7
+
+    CHAPTER III.
+    DRY FLY MAXIMS                            "      13
+
+    CHAPTER IV.
+    EDUCATION OF THE SOUTH COUNTRY TROUT      "      23
+
+    CHAPTER V.
+    THE MAY FLY                               "      27
+
+    CHAPTER VI.
+    THE EVENING RISE                          "      33
+
+    CHAPTER VII.
+    "JACK"                                    "      37
+
+    CHAPTER VIII.
+    WEED CUTTING                              "      40
+
+    CHAPTER IX.
+    THE ANGLER AND AMBIDEXTERITY              "      43
+
+    CHAPTER X.
+    LOCH FISHING                             "       46
+
+    CHAPTER XI.
+    DAPPING FOR TROUT                        "       53
+
+    CHAPTER XII.
+    GRAYLING FISHING                         "       57
+
+    CHAPTER XIII.
+    NOTES ON RAINBOW TROUT                   "       61
+
+    CHAPTER XIV.
+    SALMON FISHING                           "       66
+
+    CHAPTER XV.
+    A TRIP TO IRELAND                        "       79
+
+    CHAPTER XVI.
+    SALMON AND FLIES                         "       86
+
+    CHAPTER XVII.
+    SALMON OF THE AWE                        "       91
+
+    CHAPTER XVIII.
+    DISAPPOINTING DAYS                       "       97
+
+    CHAPTER XIX.
+    SEA TROUT FISHING AND ITS CHANCES       "       106
+
+    L'ENVOI                                 "       113
+
+
+
+
+CHATS ON ANGLING
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTORY.
+
+
+TO those who love angling, with all its associations and surroundings,
+no apology may be needed for inflicting on them in book form certain
+short articles which have mainly appeared in the columns of the
+_Field_. They are "Chats" rather than didactic deliverances, and are
+offered in the belief that much will be forgiven to a brother angler,
+since all that pertains to the beloved pastime has some interest, and
+the experiences of the poorest writer that ever recorded his views and
+fancies may haply strike some responsive note.
+
+But to the outside world, to those who care nought for all we hold
+so dear, to those who would rank all fishermen as fools, and would
+classify them as Dr. Johnson was said to have done--to such these notes
+cannot appeal; they will regard them, not unnaturally perhaps, as yet
+one more addition, of a desultory kind, to an already overladen subject.
+
+No form of sport has so enduring a charm to its votaries as angling.
+Its praises have been sung for centuries, from Dame Julia Berners
+to the present day. Once an angler, always an angler; years roll by
+only to increase the fervour of our devotion. It is a quiet, simple,
+unassuming kind of madness, without any of the excitement or the
+glamour of the race meeting or of the hunting field, and the love and
+the madness are incomprehensible and inexplicable to those who neither
+share them nor know them.
+
+The quiet stroll by the stream or river bank, the constant communing
+with nature, the watching of bird and insect life, appeal with
+irresistible force and power to the angler. As the short winter days
+draw out, and spring begins to assert her revivifying powers, the
+longing, intense as ever, comes over us, and we yearn for the river
+side. And the lessons that we learn from our love for it are not
+without value; patience and self-control come naturally to those who
+have the real angling instinct.
+
+How widely spread this natural instinct is we may gather from observing
+the long lines of fishermen, each with his few feet of bank pegged
+out, engaged in some competition, and watching with intense interest
+for long hours the quiet float in front of him. Give him but a better
+chance of following up his instinct, and doubtless he would take with
+increased zeal to those higher branches of the sport that appeal more
+directly to most of us--the keenness is there, the opportunity alone is
+wanting.
+
+Seeing that fishing and its charms have been so amply extolled and set
+forth by such able and various pens, from Father Walton, the merchant,
+prince of all writers on this subject, down to later days in continuous
+line, through such names as Kingsley (man of letters), or Sir Edward
+Grey (man of affairs)--writers whose works will live, and who can
+inspire in us the enthusiasm of sympathetic feeling--why, it may be
+asked, is it that we are not content, and that so many of us cannot
+refrain from publishing our impressions? There can be no answer to this
+query except it be as in my own case, the confession of a desire to
+record some of the experiences, gained through many years, in the hope
+that some crumb of information may be gleaned therefrom, and that the
+pleasure taken in recording them may find a responsive echo in some
+breast.
+
+I would wish at once to disarm possible criticism by candidly admitting
+that this little work has no literary, or indeed any other pretensions.
+It is merely what it purports to be--a series of articles strung
+together, with the object that I have already described.
+
+I would desire also to thank the proprietors of the _Field_ for their
+permission to reprint such articles as have already appeared in that
+paper. My thanks are also due to my old friend Mr. W. Senior and to Mr.
+Sheringham for having been kind enough to glance through my MSS. and
+give me the benefit of their most valued criticism.
+
+    WARDLEY HALL, _August, 1905_.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+IN PRAISE OF THE DRY FLY.
+
+
+THE methods of the "Dry Fly" Fisherman, as compared with those of
+his brother of the "Wet Fly," are absolutely distinct, and demand
+totally different characteristics. It is idle to compare them, or to
+praise one to the disparagement of the other. The sooner this kind
+of carping criticism is entirely abandoned the better. The dry fly
+purist may argue until he is black in the face; he will never convert
+the wet fly devotee. Nor, on the other hand, is there the slightest
+chance of the South Country chalk stream Angler being induced to
+give up his favourite form of sport. Quite apart from the fact that
+different waters require different treatment, the two methods appeal to
+absolutely different temperaments. Take for example the wet fly man.
+He wends his way, probably down stream, fishing all the fishable water
+before him, carefully searching with his flies all the quick water and
+stickles; placing his flies deftly near the eddy by that half-sunken
+rock, round which the swirl comes, forming a convenient resting-place
+for a goodly trout; or with careful underhand cast searches under the
+overhanging branches of yonder tree; always alert and on the move,
+leaving untried no likely holt, keeping as far as possible out of
+sight, and showing himself to be a master of his art. But he has always
+a roving commission. He may, of course, elect to fish up stream, and
+many an expert in that line may be met with; but, even then, his art
+differs radically from that of the angler with the floating fly.
+
+[Illustration: WAITING FOR A RISE.]
+
+From the latter are required in a special degree a quick and accurate
+eye, great delicacy and accuracy in the actual cast, and above all, a
+quiet, watchful disposition; he cannot whip the water on the chance of
+catching an unseen trout. His _rôle_ is to scan the water, to watch
+the duns and ascertain their identity, to spot at once the dimple of
+a rising fish, and to differentiate between such a rise and the swirl
+made by a tailing fish. He will note the flow of the stream, and
+whether he will have to counteract the fateful drag. Having made up
+his mind, arranged his plan of action, and selected his fly, he will
+crawl up as near as may be desirable below his fish, taking care not to
+alarm in his approach any other that may lie between him and it; then,
+after one or two preliminary casts to regulate his distance, he will
+despatch his fly, to alight, as lightly as may be, some three or four
+inches above his fish. His field glasses will have told him, even if
+his natural eyesight could not, the quality of the fish he is trying
+for, and for good or evil his cast is made.
+
+Perhaps he has under-estimated the distance, and if it be a bank
+fish he is attacking his fly may float down some twelve inches from
+the bank under which the fish is lying. In that case he will not
+withdraw it until it is well past the trout, but he may have noted
+that half-defined, but encouraging, movement which the trout made as
+the fly sailed past. His next cast is a better one, and, guided by the
+stream under the bank, the fly, jauntily cocking, an olive quill of
+the right size and shade, will pass over the trout's nose. A natural
+dun comes along abreast of his; will his poor imitation be taken in
+preference to the Simon pure? By the powers, it is! A confident upward
+tilt of the trout, a pink mouth opens, and the 000 hook is sucked in;
+one turn of the wrist, and he is hooked. Despite a mad dash up stream
+the bonnie two-pounder--in the lusty vigour of high condition--is soon
+controlled and steadied by the even strain of the ten-foot cane-built
+rod. Down stream now he rushes; he will soon exhaust himself at that
+game. Keep quietly below him, and keep the rod-point up. That was a
+narrow squeak! He nearly gained that weed-bank! Had he effected his
+purpose, nothing but hand-lining would have had the slightest chance
+of extricating him, but the rod strain being applied at the right
+moment and in the right direction, the gallant fish is turned back.
+That effort, happily counteracted, has beaten him; he soon begins to
+flop upon the surface and show evident signs of surrendering. The
+landing net is quietly disengaged and half submerged in the stream
+below him--for if he sees it he will be nerved to fresh efforts--and
+his head being kept up, he is guided without fuss into its embrace. And
+after he is given his instant and humane quietus with one tap, rightly
+placed, of the "Priest," the pipe is lit, tackle is adjusted, and there
+is leisure to admire the beautiful proportions of a newly caught trout,
+the glorious colouring of his spots and golden belly. Something has
+been accomplished, something done. A fair stalk has been rewarded, and
+it is no chance success.
+
+Those happy days when there is a good rise of fly, when the fish are
+in their stations, heads up, and lying near the top of the water, and
+the wind is not too contrary, should indeed be gratefully remembered. A
+short length of water will suffice for the dry fly man--a few hundred
+yards. For him there need be no restless rushing from place to place.
+Quiet watching and waiting, constant observation of what is going on in
+the river beneath him, these are his requirements.
+
+But on the days when the rise is scant and short, and the trout seem
+to be all glued to the bottom, or when a strong down stream wind
+nearly baffles the angler, then his patience will be somewhat sorely
+tested; even under these discouraging conditions there are places in
+the river unswept by wind, most rivers having a serpentine course; on
+one of these our angler will take up his position, and his patience and
+perseverance will be rewarded. And if the trout be, as I have said,
+glued to the bed of the river, and there is no rise of fly to tempt
+them to the surface, he will wait patiently. It will not be always so;
+a change of temperature will come or some subtle atmospheric change
+about which we know so little, but which effects a wonderful change
+in the trout. They begin, as it were, at such changes to wake up from
+their lethargy, to come nearer to the surface and to re-assume their
+favourite positions--at the tail of yonder weed bank--or in the oily
+glide under the bank side. The first few flies of the hatch may be
+allowed to pass by them, apparently unheeded or unnoticed, but before
+long they settle down to feeding in a serious manner. Now is your
+opportunity, make the most of it; and if you keep well down and make
+no bungling cast, your creel will soon be somewhat weightier than it
+promised to be a short hour ago. Our friend the chalk stream trout will
+brook no bungling; he is easily put down and scared, and the delicate
+accuracy needed in securing him forms the most potent of the many
+charms of this most beautiful of sports.
+
+Should, as may often prove to be the case, the unpropitious conditions
+continue without improvement, our angler is not without resource. His
+surroundings are so entirely congenial; he lies on the fresh green
+meadow-grass, the hedgerows ablaze with blossom, the copses in their
+newly-donned green mantles, blue with the shimmering sheen of countless
+blue-bells, are full of rejoicing and of promise. The birds, instinct
+with their love-making and nesting operations, are full of life; all
+nature seems to be vigorous with new-born hope. The true angler can
+rejoice with them all, sharing their pleasure and delight, drinking
+in pure draughts of ozone, and adding, perchance, to his store of
+knowledge of insect and animal life. His field glasses, as he lies
+prone and sheltered, bring him within touch and range of many sights
+that otherwise would have passed unnoticed. That water vole coasting
+along the bank side, pausing incontinently to sit up and look around,
+those rabbits playing near the burrow mouth, the moorhens cruising
+round the flags and sedges, all afford interest and instruction. In the
+very grass on which he lies he will find ample scope for observation
+and amusement in his enforced leisure should he care to watch the
+teeming multitudes of insects that throng it, his ears meanwhile being
+solaced and refreshed by countless woodland songsters.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+DRY FLY TACKLE AND EQUIPMENT.
+
+
+MODERN glued-up cane rods have practically done away with hickory, blue
+gum, or other wooden rods--at any rate, as far as dry fly angling is
+concerned. Their action when well made is so true and quick, they pick
+up the line from the water in the way their forerunners never could;
+they are not liable to snap or break, and if tended carefully are very
+long-lived. Most of us have old favourite greenheart or other rods,
+companions in many a pleasant hour. We would not part with them, but on
+the other hand would leave them lying in their cases, taking out our
+cane rods in preference. The big grip on the butt, whether of cork,
+leather, or wood, prevents to a great extent the cramp to the fingers
+that would be certain to come from using our former small-butted rods
+in dry fly work.
+
+Built-up cane rods vary, of course, greatly in quality and durability.
+Cheap ones may be bought, and they will certainly turn out a dear
+purchase. It is best to buy one from the very best makers only, and
+eschew as worthless all cheap imitations. Having decided to purchase
+a built-up rod, we have to consider its length, etc. It is, I think,
+generally agreed that a length of from 9 ft. 6 in. to 10 ft. 6 in.
+is ample--the latter, in my opinion, for choice. Messrs. Hardy, of
+Alnwick and London, have devoted so much labour and attention to
+built-up rods as to deserve a somewhat pre-eminent position amongst
+the many successful firms that make them. This firm produces many
+forms of rods suitable for dry fly work. Their "Perfection" rod is a
+very sweet weapon for the purpose, quick in its action, true as steel,
+has great power of recovery, and is light in the hand; but for choice
+I would pin my faith to one of their 10 ft. 6 in. "Pope" rods in two
+pieces. Such a one has been my constant companion for some seasons,
+and, though other makers may be able to turn out as good a rod, I feel
+convinced that none could turn out a better. The old attachments of
+the ferrules of former days have also gone by the board, and a bayonet
+joint has superseded them, to our great advantage. The upper ring on
+the point should be of the Bickerdyke pattern, the other rod rings of
+the ordinary snake pattern and made of German silver. The reel fittings
+should be of the "Universal" type, a conical socket taking one end of
+the reel base, the other end being secured by a loose ring. Personally,
+I do not care for a spear; I find them awkward at times, their only
+advantage being that your rod may be spiked when putting on a fly or
+when hand-lining a "weeded" fish. If one is desired, it should be
+carried inside the handle of the butt, the button screwing over it and
+holding it in its place.
+
+I would not advocate a steel-centred rod, at any rate for a
+single-handed trout rod. The absolute union of metal and cane can never
+be secured, nor can the action of the two be precisely identical.
+Besides, how are you advantaged? The hexagonal form of the built-up rod
+is ideal for strength, and a rod without a steel centre can be made
+with perfect action, able to do all that may be required of it.
+
+Reels also have undergone great improvements of late years. They are
+lighter, more easily cleaned, the check action is better regulated; a
+double check spring that allows the line to be reeled up quickly and
+easily, and at the same time offers a stronger resistance to an outward
+pull, is now almost universally employed. Aluminium, thin-brazed steel,
+have replaced brass and even ebonite. The air is admitted to the coils
+of line, and reeling up is rendered more rapid and effective. The
+"Moscrop" reel is excellent in many ways, and fulfils many of the chief
+requirements of modern reels, it has, moreover, a screw drag, which can
+be used to regulate the retarding action of the check. Messrs. Hardy
+produce an altogether admirable reel, which they have patented and call
+the "Perfect." Such a reel for an ordinary cane-built rod of the length
+we have chosen should be three inches in diameter, and will carry
+forty yards of tapered line, with some backing, if thought necessary or
+desirable.
+
+Avoid for choice patent aluminium American reels. I have one by me
+whilst writing. The check action is outside, and can be taken off
+at pleasure and the line allowed to run freely without hindrance.
+The perforated face of the drum which carries the handle is
+counter-balanced, so that it may be used as a Nottingham reel. But the
+main advantage claimed is that the rim, within which the drum revolves
+freely, is springy, and by pressing the thumb upon it the drum is at
+once arrested and its revolution stopped. Of course, by this means
+your line can be absolutely stopped at any moment should a fish make
+a determined rush into any obstacle, but at the expense of your fly
+and cast. I am told that experts with this reel cast with a free line,
+arresting the fly at the precise moment required by the thumb pressure,
+and thereby assisting themselves in judging the length of the cast, and
+that the check is never clicked into action until the fish is hooked.
+I have often tried it, and found that the inadvertent pressure of the
+thumb or wrist upon the rim has cost me several good fish. In fixing
+your reel, I would counsel its being so placed that the handle is on
+the left side of the rod. In playing the fish it will be necessary,
+therefore, to reverse your rod; the line will then run near the rod and
+avoid the friction against the rings, and the strain will be taken off
+your rod, or, rather, applied in a contrary direction to that which it
+so constantly receives when casting.
+
+The line should be tapered, and should be of oil-dressed silk, such
+as is now supplied by all good tackle makers. The taper should be
+five or six yards in length, and when in use, in order to obviate the
+constant shortening process it receives from attaching it to your
+cast, I invariably whip a length of stoutish grilse gut to its end,
+to which I attach my cast. This upper length can always be renewed at
+pleasure. This plan I find better than a loop. The weight of the line
+is a most important point; it should be as heavy in its centre part
+beyond the taper as will bring out the best casting powers of your rod.
+The balance of the line to the rod is all important; a little trouble
+in selecting a suitable line will be amply repaid. Do not forget, after
+using it, to draw off many coils of line to dry before finally putting
+your reel away, and, as it is important that your line should float
+well, do not forget to take some deer's fat with you with which to
+anoint it.
+
+We next come to the cast. Two and a half yards of tapered gut are all
+that is necessary, tapered from stout to the finest undrawn procurable.
+I would discard drawn gut altogether, possibly because I am too clumsy
+to use it to my satisfaction. It is generally, however, easy to procure
+real undrawn gut of sufficient fineness from such firms as Ramsbottom,
+and a hank of such gut, in fifteen or sixteen-inch strands, should
+always be acquired when found. If kept out of the light, wrapped
+preferably in chamois leather, it will keep a long time. Take with
+you some dozen or so of such strands and a spare made-up cast in your
+damping box, and you will have all you will require in a day's fishing.
+
+Your landing-net should be ample in circumference. The net itself deep
+and commodious; the ring should be solid, of bent wood, with a knuckle
+joint of gunmetal to attach it to the handle. The net should be of
+dressed cord, so that the fly will not become fixed in the knots. It
+is a great mistake to have too short a handle; you may have to reach
+far over sedges to get at your fish to land him. If you sling your
+landing-net on your left side, as is usually done, a long handle is
+very inconvenient in kneeling; therefore, use a telescope handle for
+choice. Wading trousers or stockings and brogues will complete your
+equipment, though, of course, some kind of basket or bag will be needed
+to enable you to carry your luncheon, your tackle, and your fish. All
+tackle makers will supply you with an ample assortment for choice in
+this matter. Possibly a waterproof bag with partitions and an outside
+net to place the fish in is the most convenient. Small linen bags in
+which to place the fish or linen cloths in which to wrap them are not
+out of place. One further article I should advise you to take with
+you, and that is a good pair of field glasses. They will multiply the
+pleasure of your stalk tenfold. With them you can search the water
+before you can spot effectively the most desirable fish, and ascertain
+more exactly what flies the fish are taking; whilst, if nothing is
+doing and the fish are lying like stones on the river bed or huddled
+away in the recesses of the weeds, you can amuse yourself with watching
+bird life and while away the time to your infinite pleasure.
+
+Having fully equipped ourselves so far, we have now to consider our
+flies. I take it that no one who fishes with the floating fly nowadays
+clings to the use of flies mounted upon gut. Eyed flies have no doubt
+replaced them for all time. The very drying of your fly is too severe
+upon the heads of gut-mounted flies. Eyed hooks have, however, had
+to fight their way to the front, so prejudiced are we all, and I can
+picture to myself now a prominent legislator, a great angler and the
+author of one of the best sporting books published of late, standing by
+me on Test side, on a meadow near Longparish, his cap literally covered
+with artificial flies attached to strands of gut--a most extraordinary
+sight. The fish were most unkind, taking greedily some kind of small
+black insect, or fisherman's curse. We had offered them every kind of
+midge fly or black gnat we could think of, with scant success. Our
+friend, in gazing for the twentieth time at his fly-bedecked cap, saw a
+group of black ants, on gut, amongst others. The first one put on not
+only procured a rise, but hooked the fish; one run, and he was gone,
+the fly remaining in his mouth. So with the next. In vain we soaked the
+gut; each fly met with the same result--it was at once taken and the
+fish was at once lost. The gut was absolutely rotten, and that pattern
+of ant was apparently the only medicine. Our friend fairly danced
+upon the bank in rage and disappointment. And it was all he could
+do to restrain himself from dancing on his rod and from using very
+unparliamentary language. I believe that even he is a convert to eyed
+flies now.
+
+Whether the flies should have turned up or turned down eyes is a matter
+of controversy. Personally, I prefer the latter. In any case, the eye
+should not be too small, or much mental anguish will result. It is
+needless to say that they should be well tempered and with sound barbs.
+They should be tested in a piece of soft wood.
+
+Have a reserve box of flies, made in compartments, so that you can
+replenish from time to time the little box you carry with you. This
+pocket box may be quite small. I like one three inches square and
+one inch deep, with rounded corners, and with bars of cork across it
+inside. It will carry all you need. My pliers I always attach to one
+of the buttons of my coat, as otherwise I am always misplacing them.
+Nothing beats Major Turle's Knot as an attachment of the gut collar to
+the fly.
+
+If you should be fishing the evening rise at a time when it is
+difficult to thread the eye of a fly, even with the expenditure of
+many matches, do not forget before you go out to mount some sedges or
+large red quills upon fairly stout gut points and put them in your cap.
+They will come in most usefully, and save a strain upon your temper.
+
+The use of deodorised mineral oil for anointing your flies has been
+greatly decried of late. I can only say that it is a great assistance,
+especially on a pouring wet day, and I should be sorry to be without
+it. I do not like, however, the inconvenient bottle generally carried
+for this purpose. I use a common metal matchbox, in which I have
+placed a piece of spungeo-piline, on which I have poured a few drops
+of the oil. The hackles of the fly can be pressed against this, and
+so anointed with the greatest ease. Fish do not appear to mind the
+appearance of the oil that, of course, appears to float round your fly;
+and, as they do not mind and it enables you better to keep your fly
+floating and cocked under adverse conditions, why not use it?
+
+As to the flies to be used, as I have said in another chapter, the
+fewer the better.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+SOME DRY FLY MAXIMS.
+
+
+IT would ill become a humble follower of the art to enter into a
+minute description of the various methods of casting, seeing that the
+subject has been so fully thrashed out by Mr. Halford, in his "Dry Fly
+Fishing"; mere repetition would be both wearisome and valueless. If
+anyone needs instruction on the subject, let him turn to that volume,
+and read, mark, and learn. It seems to me, however, that a correct
+style can best be obtained by accompanying and watching a really
+competent fisherman. No amount of book reading will secure this, and
+as in all kindred sports, practice, and intelligent practice, is
+absolutely necessary if the tyro would aspire to any excellence. The
+art of fishing the floating fly is not one that will admit of any
+mediocrity. It requires and demands such accuracy, such co-ordination
+of delicacy and strength, that mediocrity is impossible.
+
+A few points may, however, be discussed with advantage. First, and
+foremost, do not be ambitious as to the length of line you can cast,
+or the amount of water you can cover. Be content, rather, to fish
+with just that length of line that you can control with ease and
+accuracy. In the actual act of casting never sway the body; keep the
+trunk rigidly still, never let your hand, in the backward cast, go
+beyond a vertical point above your shoulder; keeping the elbow near
+the side, get all the work you can out of the rod; it will do all that
+is required of it so long as you do not over-cast with it. Watch the
+expert angler; how easily he works his twenty yards of line; there is
+an entire absence of all effort; it looks as easy as shelling peas.
+The beginner or duffer will invariably put too much effort into his
+cast; he will not allow time for the line to extend itself behind him;
+he will bring his hand so far back that the fly will be hung up in
+the grasses or bushes behind him, and the force of his forward cast
+will make the line cut the water like a knife, and the fly will be
+delivered in the midst of a series of curls of gut, presenting anything
+but an attractive appearance to the fish. The movement of the hand in
+an accomplished fisherman is singularly slight; I doubt if it ever
+traverses much more than twelve inches from the vertical position.
+
+Rest content with the ordinary overhead cast until you are an absolute
+master of it. When this desirable result is accomplished, there are one
+or two casts well deserving of care and attention. One in particular
+you should seek to accomplish--viz., the cast into the teeth of an
+adverse wind. Recollect that, under those circumstances, you can
+usually approach much nearer to fish than when the wind is up stream or
+non-existent; therefore you can use a shorter line. The cast is called
+the "downward" cast, and is really very simple. The backward part is
+the same as in ordinary casting, but in the forward delivery the hand
+traverses a much greater angle, and at the finish the rod point is near
+to the water. At the moment of delivery the elbow is brought up level
+with the shoulder, the thumb is depressed, the knuckles being kept
+uppermost. The resultant effect is that the line cuts straight into
+the wind, and is little affected by it. In a foul wind flies cock and
+float more easily than in a down stream wind; so this, at any rate,
+is in your favour. Yet one more style of casting should be practised.
+I have found it invaluable when awkward trees have been overhanging
+my own bank. It is what is called by salmon anglers the "Spey Cast."
+Inasmuch as it avoids the necessity of bringing your line behind you,
+its value is self-evident. This is the method of the cast: Having got
+out as much line as you think you will need, get it out up stream of
+you, bring the fly quickly towards you out of the water, allow the fly
+just to kiss the water when it is just level with you, the curve of the
+line being down stream of you, then, with a similar kind of action to
+that advocated for the downward cast, your line will be sent forward
+in a series of coils to the desired spot. It is always worth trying
+and may secure you a good fish, one perhaps that others have passed by
+as unapproachable, and which may thereby have acquired a confidence
+that may be misplaced. This form of casting is much easier in salmon
+fishing, as you are then fishing down stream, and the water extends
+and straightens your line for you. It is, however, quite easy of
+accomplishment, with a moderately short line, in up stream fishing.
+
+Mr. Halford, in "Dry Fly Angling," p. 62, describes a cast which
+he terms the "Switch Cast," and it is one which, though difficult
+of acquisition, will accomplish the same object. He says, "It is
+accomplished by drawing the line towards you on the water, and throwing
+the fly with a kind of roll outwards on the water--in fact, a sort of
+downward cast; the possibility of making the cast depending upon the
+fly being in the water at the moment the rod point is brought down,"
+&c. Personally, I should prefer the Spey cast, and inasmuch as most
+salmon fishermen know something of that peculiar cast, I would urge its
+occasional use in dry fly work, more especially having regard to the
+fact that fish in such positions have acquired a confidence through
+never having been angled for, and therefore there is greater chance
+of a somewhat bungling presentment of the dry fly being overlooked.
+To describe the Spey cast accurately so as to convey the desired
+instruction in such a way that all who run may read, is not by any
+means easy; but, as I have before said, it is probably familiar to many
+anglers from salmon fishing experiences.
+
+One more thing deserves to be borne in mind: always imagine that the
+plane of the water is some foot or so higher than it really is--that
+is to say, cast as if the fish, and the water in which it lies, were a
+foot higher than in reality. The result will be that your collar will
+fall as lightly as gossamer. One of the most proficient manipulators of
+the rod and line I have ever seen can pitch a fly, cocked and floating,
+almost anywhere within reasonable limits, but his line invariably cuts
+the water from point to fly, straight and accurate enough may be, but
+like whip-cord. Consequently, he is not the successful angler that his
+qualifications entitle him to be. An ordinary fisherman casting a less
+straight, but lighter, line will frequently beat him in catching fish.
+Our friend would beat most opponents in a casting tournament, but I
+would back many that I know against him in filling a creel.
+
+Keep down out of sight, walk and crawl warily, and above all things
+avoid walking near the bank edge and unnecessarily scaring fish that
+others following you might otherwise have secured.
+
+When trout are "bulging" (that is to say, as every angler knows, when
+they are taking the "nymphæ" just below the surface), it is almost
+hopeless to endeavour to secure them with a dry, floating fly. The fish
+are intent on another kind of game, and are best left severely alone.
+
+Unfortunately, even experienced anglers are apt to be deceived by such
+a fish; the rise is often apparently that of a trout at a surface fly;
+a little careful observation will, however, convince you that such is
+not the case, for no floating flies are passing near him at the time of
+his rise. Don't waste another moment upon him, but try to find another
+in a more reasonable frame of mind. If all the fish on your stretch of
+water seem to be similarly occupied, and you are not willing to wait
+until they have decided to make a change of diet, then a gold ribbed
+hare's ear may, if fished wet, entice an odd fish, as it somewhat
+resembles a nympha.
+
+It is, however, very chance work, as is that of endeavouring to secure
+a "tailing" fish with a down stream fly sunk below the surface, and
+jerked about in front of where his nose should be. No keen angler would
+call this serious fishing--it is a mere travesty of the real sport; but
+it may serve to pass the time, and perchance to wile a trout into your
+basket. The angler's patience will, however, be far more severely tried
+when fish are "smutting." What prophet is there who can tell us what we
+should do then? Those abominable "curses," so well named, appear to be
+able to baffle entirely the skill of the ablest of our entomologists,
+and the ability of our most capable of fly dressers. No lure has yet
+been discovered that can have any reasonable hope of imitating them.
+To watch a big trout slowly and majestically sail here and there on
+a still, hot day, barely dimpling the surface as he sucks down one
+after another of these little insignificant "curses," is quite enough
+to satisfy you as to the remoteness of your chance of deceiving him.
+Nothing that human hands could tie could simulate them. Place in the
+track of one of these fish the smallest gnat in your box, attached to
+the finest of undrawn gut, delivered with the lightest and truest cast
+of which the human hand is capable and, as you watch the fish fade
+slowly down into the depths in disgust at the evident deception, you
+will realise the hopelessness of your endeavour.
+
+It is an old accusation against fishermen that they are apt to overload
+themselves with multitudinous flies, of which perhaps they never try
+half; and in this accusation there is a good deal of truth. I recollect
+one occasion in particular, when five men sallied forth to fish, and
+on their return all more or less bewailed the shyness of the trout,
+and each declared that, though he had tried many changes of fly, he
+had only found one to succeed. Oddly enough, each man had pitched on a
+different fly: they were the Driffield dun, the pale olive, the hare's
+ear and yellow, the ginger quill, and the red quill. In each case the
+size was similar, viz., 000; but the fact is, that most men have a
+favourite fly to which they pin their faith, and to which they give ten
+chances for one to the others. There are occasions, of course, where
+one fly and only one will succeed.
+
+I well remember one day, on the Tichbourne water on the Itchen, when
+that fine stretch of water was simply alive with olives, coming in
+droves and batches over the fish, and when it seemed hopeless for
+one's poor imitation to succeed, even when put correctly cocked in
+front of a batch, or behind a drove, or by itself. The trout were
+rising slowly and methodically, letting many flies pass scatheless,
+but now and then picking out one without moving an inch from their
+position. I tried vainly to discover the method of their madness, and
+at last realised that they were selecting from amongst the myriads
+of toothsome _ephemeridæ_ floating over their heads a redder-looking
+fly. I could not wade, I could not manage to get one with my landing
+net, so I put on at hazard a small red quill, with no response; then
+a Hawker's yellow got a rise or two, and even deluded a brace of fish
+into my creel, and then the glorious rise was over. Next morning, when
+whirling back to town, I found myself in a carriage with four or five
+anglers who had been fishing the next beat, and the murder was out.
+One fortunate man had ascertained that they were taking the ginger
+quills, which were very sparsely scattered amongst the olives, and that
+information resulted in his taking nine brace of beautiful fish.
+
+But as a rule, it is far more a question of the correct delivery of the
+fly than anything else, provided the size be right. For myself, I never
+leave a rising fish that I have not scared, unless I am convinced there
+is some objectionable and unavoidable drag; sooner or later you will
+get him, possibly with the same fly that has been over his head a dozen
+or so of times. We are all too ready to resort to a change of fly, and
+to leave a non-responsive fish in disgust, in the hope of finding an
+easier quarry. My advice is to stick to your fish unless, or until, he
+is scared. Possibly the most annoying fish is the one that drops slowly
+down, with his nose in close proximity to the fly, evidently uncertain
+as to whether or no it is the Simon Pure, until he gets perilously near
+to you. Even his scruples may be overcome if he gets back into position
+without being alarmed. One of the most successful anglers I ever knew
+on the upper Test, who owned a well-known stretch of water, was wont to
+sally forth with two rods put up, one of which he carried, while the
+other was carried by his keeper. On one was mounted a hare's ear, on
+the other a blue dun; and that these flies answered their purpose his
+records could testify.
+
+A difficulty that presents itself to the chalk stream angler is the
+tendency of fish when hooked and when scared by seeing the angler
+to bury themselves in the heavy masses of weed. This has now been
+discounted by the modern method of hand lining--_i.e._, spiking the rod
+and taking a good deal of slack line off the reel, and then holding
+the line in the hand and using a gentle pressure on the fish in the
+direction contrary to that in which he went. He usually responds very
+readily, and the rod may then be resumed. Indeed, it is astonishing how
+fish can be led and coaxed under this influence--the fact being that,
+the upward play of the rod always tending to lift the fish out of his
+own element and so drown him, he naturally plays hard to avoid this;
+take the upward strain off him and he becomes another creature.
+
+Yet another difficulty encountered by the dry fly fisherman is caused
+by fish coming short. What angler is there who has not experienced
+this annoyance, and how often, as Mr. Halford in his work on Dry Fly
+Fishing has noticed, does the angler find that after the first rush is
+over and the hook comes away there is a small scale firmly fixed on
+the barb, showing that the fish has been foul-hooked? My observations
+on this class of rise would lead me to believe that the fish moved to
+the fly in the ordinary manner, but that something arose to excite his
+mistrust, and that he closed his mouth while the impetus of his rise
+broke the water, making the angler think that it was a real rise, so
+that he struck, and on his striking the hook took a light hold on the
+outside--a hold seldom effective, though most fishermen have landed
+fish hooked in such a way. I have generally found in such cases that
+a smaller hook has produced a more confident rise, and my experience
+would not lead me to endorse Mr. Halford's view that the use of a 000
+hook handicaps the angler very heavily. It may do so with the heavy
+Houghton water fish, but I have not found it a severe handicap with the
+smaller trout--1 lb. to 2½ lb.--of the upper Test and similar waters.
+
+A very keen and expert dry fly fisherman, the late Mr. Harry Maxwell,
+one of the best of friends and anglers, once showed me a method of
+taking fish lying with their tails against a wire fencing that crossed
+the Test at right-angles, the wire moreover being barbed. I was fishing
+in Hurstbourne Park, and he was accompanying me, as he often did,
+with his field-glass. Below the "cascade" a four or five-stranded
+barbed wire fence went straight across the water. Just above it, in
+mid-stream, in the stickle, a plump, transparent-looking Test fish of
+about 1½ lb. had taken up his position, and was boldly taking every
+dun within reach. My friend told me to catch him, and I said at once I
+did not know how to do it without getting hung up. He then explained
+his dodge, which may be carried out as follows:--Having waded in below
+the fish, take some loose coils of line off the reel in the left hand,
+then cast well above, and let the dry well-cocked fly float down to
+him. If he accepts it and comes down under the fence slack off the
+loose coils, get up to the fence as quickly as possible, pass the rod
+under and over, and then you are free to play the trout below you. If,
+on the other hand, he refuses the fly, do not attempt to recover the
+line in the usual manner or you will inevitably be hung up. Simply
+lower your rod point to the water, and then the quiet drag of the
+stream will bring your cast and fly slowly up and over the fence, even
+although the fly had floated a foot or two down-stream and under the
+wire. The action is so slow and even that there is no chance of being
+entangled in the wires, and as a fish in such a position thinks he
+is in possession of a vantage-point, and is seldom fished for, he is
+generally a bold feeder. Having explained the method, my friend made me
+try the cast myself, and the first fly floating near enough to tempt
+the fish was taken boldly; the whole manoeuvre succeeded, and I was
+able to land my trout below me. Since then I have frequently made use
+of my experience, and with invariable success. If any anglers who are
+not aware of this method care to try the experiment they will see how
+sweetly the line travels over the fence without the slightest risk of
+entanglement.
+
+There is but little doubt that the fly that is kept going catches most
+fish. On a seemingly hopeless day an odd fish here and there can be
+picked up if really sought for; and on these days the rise, if any, is
+so inconstant and so short-lived that it may easily be missed. On such
+a day, on the wide shallows of the Longparish water of the Test, three
+of us were struggling with the adverse conditions of a lowish river, a
+bright sun, and a great lack of duns. We had agreed to meet at luncheon
+at about 1 p.m. in the hut on the river's bank. I had found a seat upon
+the upturned stump of a tree in mid-stream. There were fish all round
+me in the shallows, but all on the bottom, apparently asleep. I knew
+that if I left my place and waded ashore I should move them all. I was
+enjoying my pipe, and so sat on. The whistles and calls from the hut
+passed unheeded, for I had noticed that my friends the trout showed
+more signs of animation. An olive or two came down, and gradually the
+fish seemed to rise from the bottom and take up their positions. More
+calls from the shore. I shouted back to them not to wait, and at length
+they gave me up as a bad job.
+
+Soon a fish on my left front took an obvious olive, a pale one, and I
+had a pale olive on my cast. Still I waited, and soon the first few
+olives were followed by quite a little procession. I then cast over my
+fish, and at the first offer he took it. I got him down below me, and
+soon netted him out, wading up again most carefully and slowly to my
+seat; and from that position, in about twenty minutes, got seven fish
+in succession, all taken with the same fly and from the same spot.
+They were none of them very big, it is true, but they were all over a
+pound in weight. By this time my friends had finished their luncheon,
+and came out of the hut just as I was netting my seventh fish. Hastily
+getting their rods, they were just in time to get a fish apiece from
+the bankside, and the rise was over. Moreover, it was the only rise
+vouchsafed to us that morning or afternoon. So that the moral is that
+you can never tell when the psychological moment may arrive, and may
+easily miss it when it does come if you are lying on your back reading
+a novel, or with your eyes anywhere but on the water. One must lunch,
+no doubt, but it can generally be best enjoyed in the outer air, where
+you can watch the water and the fish whilst enjoying your luncheon and
+your rest. And on such inauspicious days do not relax your precautions
+in approaching the water, or from nonchalance or weariness allow
+yourself to cast carelessly. Your field glasses will often reveal to
+you a more likely fish--at the tail of the weed, maybe, or under the
+thorn bush on the opposite bank--and it may be worth while to float a
+fly over him and give him a trial. If he accepts the offer he is worth
+to you several got out under more favourable conditions.
+
+When fish are really smutting, and the water is almost boiling with
+rises, the angler's patience is most sorely tried. Nothing seems to
+tempt them; the smallest gnats ever tied are far too big. Who will
+tell us what to do in such a case? In truth, I know not. All I can say
+is that they are in a peculiarly aggravating humour. How vexatious,
+too, are the tailing fish, boring their heads into the weeds and
+breaking the water with their broad tails--and their tails always look
+particularly broad at such times. I have at times caught them with a
+big alder, fished wet, and jerked past them when they have finished
+for the moment their diving operations, and their heads are up. It is
+chance work, and, if not productive of much use of the landing-net,
+will serve to pass the time and amuse you; for if you don't succeed in
+hooking many you will certainly get an occasional one to run at your
+fly, his back fin breaking the water and making as big a wave as if
+he were twice the size. In the quick water by the hatch holes on such
+a day you may find a rising fish, though when hooked he will probably
+prove unsizeable.
+
+Never despair or give it up, unless you are one of the fortunate
+individuals who live by their water side, and who can therefore pick
+and choose. Where all days are yours it would be folly to persevere on
+really bad ones; but most of us are not so favourably situated, and we
+have to make the most of the odd chances we get. Therefore my counsel
+is to examine and watch the water, and be ever on the alert.
+
+Where Sunday fishing is not permitted, the day of rest always seems
+to be the best angling day of the week, and you are tempted to be
+annoyed and objurgate Dame Fortune. Even then, if you are a wise man,
+you can turn such a day to your advantage by stalking up the water as
+carefully as if you were fishing, and by making mental notes that will
+very materially assist you on the following day. And if Sunday fishing
+is allowed, do not give umbrage to many of the parishioners going to
+church by making a parade of your waders and fishing rod. Either get
+to your water before church time or else wait till the church bells
+are over before you walk along the village street. Busy City men get
+scant leisure for sport, and may fairly be excused for utilising their
+week-end holiday to the full. Much latitude may be allowed to them in
+this respect, provided they are careful not to outrage the religious
+feelings of others. A walk along the river bank, enjoying and drinking
+in to the full the beauties of Nature and of God's creation, may be as
+productive of good to yourself as an indifferent sermon. It depends
+upon your temperament and the power that the beauties of Nature have
+over your mind. They can preach as eloquent a sermon as was ever
+delivered from the pulpit, and may produce in you a frame of mind that
+may be of real and lasting benefit to you. No man should be judged
+hastily by narrow-minded bigots, or be termed a Sabbath-breaker for so
+acting.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+EDUCATION OF THE SOUTH-COUNTRY TROUT.
+
+
+SURELY angling with the dry fly can be claimed as the highest branch
+of the gentle craft? It cannot be doubted that those who have once
+experienced the fascination of "spotting" and stalking a well-fed
+and highly-educated south-country trout are bitten for life, and
+are, especially at first, rendered somewhat unappreciative of the
+sister art. The best fisherman is he who can best adapt himself to
+his environment and is ready to adopt the method most likely to be
+successful on the water he happens to be fishing. But undoubtedly
+dry-fishing labours under one serious disadvantage that does not affect
+the wet-fly fisherman, namely, the much dreaded drag, so sadly familiar
+to those who fish the rise with the floating fly. Who is there,
+however, who has not experienced legitimate pride and pleasure when, by
+change of position or by deft casting, its baleful effects have been
+overcome and discounted?
+
+It is not given to everyone to command the sleight of hand of a master
+and to be able at will to pitch a fly, cocked and floating exactly
+right, whilst a bag of the line has been simultaneously sent up stream,
+so that for a short few moments whilst passing over the fateful spot
+the fly may float truly with the stream, out of the influence of the
+more rapid water between the fish and the fisherman. In streams where
+wading is allowed the fisherman has undoubtedly an advantage, as he
+can get more directly behind the fish, and so avoid the heavy current.
+But wading is not always feasible in waters such as those of the lower
+Test, where the depth of the stream precludes it. Even then, skill and
+local knowledge will often overcome the difficulty, and a fish in such
+a position usually falls a ready victim to the fly that floats truly,
+as he has been lulled into a sense of false security by his previous
+experience that dangerous flies leave a trailing mark behind them. But
+what a revelation it is of the education that trout have received, and
+how capable they are of absorbing and profiting by it! It seems almost
+as if the constant catching and destruction of the freest rising fish
+must be having effect in leaving those only to propagate their species
+which are either past masters in cunning or which are more coarsely
+organised fish, that devote their time and energies to bottom feeding
+and avoid surface feeding, except, possibly, at night; the universally
+acknowledged fact that fish are far more difficult to catch than they
+formerly were may thus be explained. Certainly, nowadays, an angler
+would be somewhat out of it who tried to emulate the far-famed Colonel
+Hawker, of Long Parish, and to catch the wily trout in that beautiful
+stretch of the Test while fishing off a horse's back. Nor could any
+modern angler hope or expect to approach the baskets that were formerly
+creeled. So is it everywhere. On the beautiful Driffield Beck, in
+Yorkshire, a paradise for the dry-fly angler, the club limit of ten
+brace of sizeable fish in one day used to be constantly attained, and
+that, too, with the wet fly up or even down stream. Now, with split
+cane rods, the finest gut, and the deftest of floating duns, five or
+six brace is about the best basket obtainable by experienced and most
+skilful anglers.
+
+[Illustration: BRINGING HIM DOWN TO THE NET.]
+
+The natural question that perplexes and worries chalk-stream anglers is
+whether this "advanced" education of brook and river trout is to go on
+increasing. If we can only hope to catch half the amount of fish our
+progenitors did, what are the prospects of the next generation? Shall
+we have to fall back on black bass or rainbow trout to secure a race
+of free-rising fish? Or does the fault lie in over-cutting of weeds
+and bad river farming? I am inclined to think it does. Riverside mills
+are in an almost hopeless position commercially. The miller requires a
+heavier head of water than formerly, and with a decaying industry it is
+hard to refuse him, the result being that to maintain his head of water
+the weeds are ruthlessly and unscientifically cut over vast stretches
+of water, shallows are bared, and the holts or refuges of trout are
+done away with, and as a natural consequence trout become less
+confiding and far more easily alarmed. Modern agricultural drainage
+has, moreover, increased the difficulty by carrying off the water
+too rapidly. It behoves votaries of the gentle art to consider most
+carefully whether anything can be done to remedy the seriousness of the
+future outlook, and to disseminate the results of their inquiry; and if
+the Fly Fishers' Club, or some well-known leaders of repute, would take
+the matter up and tackle it seriously they would earn the blessings of
+the angling world.
+
+It is considered to be undoubtedly a disadvantage in a club water to
+include one or two pre-eminently brilliant anglers, as it seems to
+breed a fear of their always being able to catch the easy fish, so
+that the more difficult ones only are left for the ordinary angler to
+attack. Not long ago I was invited to fish a certain well-known beat on
+the Itchen, but my host, in inviting me, said, "I don't know if it is
+much use, for So-and-So fishes our water, and has caught all the easy
+fish." This may be true in a sense, but favourite positions are always
+re-taken by other fish if the former occupant is killed. Just as a
+house in Grosvenor Square, or some well-known centre of fashion, will
+always secure a tenant, so a position where the trend of the current
+brings the flies quietly and steadily over a fish will never remain
+unoccupied. It is not so much the fish that is easy as his position,
+and therefore the ordinary duffer need never despond. One thing is
+certain--that the brilliant angler will never scare fish unnecessarily,
+and I would rather fish behind such an one than a so-called angler who,
+having successfully put his fish down by bad angling, proceeds to stand
+upright and possibly walk along the bankside close to the water's edge,
+scaring many a fish on his way up, utterly regardless of his brother
+anglers. Indeed, in this respect I think the etiquette of angling is
+hardly sufficiently considered in these modern days. Who is there that
+has not met, on club waters, the ardent and unsuccessful angler who
+wanders up and down, covering vast stretches of water, and effectually
+scaring many otherwise takeable fish, in the vain hope that he may
+find some purblind trout idiotic enough to take his proffered fly? I
+consider that unwritten etiquette demands that the utmost care should
+be taken by fishermen to do all in their power to prevent spoiling the
+sport of those who may be following. I can well recollect a day when
+the wind was foul, and there was one stretch of water sheltered on
+the windward side by a thick belt of trees, and in this stretch were
+located many heavy fish. Working up to that water, I found an ardent
+ignoramus doing "sentry-go" up and down the stream, walking on the very
+edge of the water. I presume he thought that if he only persevered he
+would eventually find the "fool of the family," but the result--the
+inevitable result--was that the fish were scared throughout that whole
+length for the rest of that day, as that stretch was bare and sadly
+lacking in shelter.
+
+In considering the merits and demerits of dry-fly fishing, one
+cannot be altogether blind to the fact that down-stream fishing must
+inevitably prick and therefore educate many more fish than the floating
+fly. This being so, it is still more inexplicable that in former days,
+in chalk-stream waters, our forerunners were able to account for far
+heavier baskets of trout than we are, despite the heavy restocking
+our streams now receive, to their great advantage; and we necessarily
+come back to the old point, what can we do to secure an adequacy of
+free-rising fish? Is our system of fishing the rise wrong? Or does the
+mischief lie more in our river, water, and weed management? And can we
+so improve these as to obtain the desired results? Angling is now so
+much sought after, chalk-stream and other similar waters command such
+high rents, that surely it is worth the while of those interested in
+the sport to initiate and carry through some exhaustive inquiry into
+the subject.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE MAY FLY.
+
+
+THE May fly is up! Every year, about the first week in June, telegrams
+to this effect are hurriedly despatched to those favoured few who own
+or rent water where this member of the _ephemeridæ_ disports himself.
+It used to be called the May fly Carnival. There are, however, grave
+disadvantages in connection with our friend that greatly discount the
+apparent advantages. Fish gorged with this luscious food are wont to
+try a course of semi-starvation after their over-indulgence, and for a
+long time will not look at smaller and more wholesome diet. Then, to
+my thinking, a May fly is a horrible thing to cast with. It is not at
+all like casting with the more delicate duns or quill gnats. There is a
+clumsy feeling about it; it is exceedingly difficult to dry, and if you
+catch a fish a change of fly is at once necessary, the old chawed-up
+imitation being rendered useless. It is also not easy to get exactly
+the right pattern to suit, though for choice the small dark-winged May
+fly has given me the best results. It is, unless you live near your
+water, very difficult to hit off the precise day--you are always too
+early or too late; you are told "You should have been there yesterday;
+there was a grand rise of fly, and the fish were simply mad after them,
+and no one was on the water"--and so on. Cheery news, no doubt, when
+you find the fish all lying near the bottom. When they really are on,
+there is excitement enough; mad splashes all round you, frequently made
+by the smaller fish. Your proffered imitation may produce a rise or
+two, but somehow or other the fish don't take hold as you think they
+ought. You are inclined to lose your calmness of mental balance, to
+cast without sufficient care and with a half-dried fly. In desperation
+you put on a fair-sized red quill, fish more carefully, and probably
+get better results.
+
+The main charm, however, lies in the fact that the advent of _Ephemera
+Danica_ does bring up the big fish of the water in a way that no other
+fly food does or can. Hence its popularity, and in waters where the
+May fly is hatched in quantity, and there are heavy, big fish that as
+a rule find cannibalism pay better than duns, then the May fly has a
+real value. In other waters, however, were these big monsters taken out
+in order to secure a larger numerical stock of comparatively small but
+sizeable fish, I would have none of it; I would prefer to extend my
+angling season rather than take a large bulk of it condensed into one
+week of questionable pleasure.
+
+Certainly, the May fly season comes at about the best time of the year
+to enjoy angling. A fine week about the commencement of June is most
+enjoyable on any river. All nature is at its best--leafy June, when
+sauntering by the riverside, even with scanty sport, is in itself a
+pleasure not to be despised.
+
+Mr. Sidney Buxton, in his admirable "Fishing and Shooting," graphically
+describes a day in the Carnival time, when he grassed thirty fish
+from two pounds down, and of another when he creeled forty; but, good
+sportsman as he is, I rather fancy he would have enjoyed even more a
+day with half to a third of the basket when each fish had been stalked
+and picked out with a small fly. Not for a moment would I suggest or
+imply that equal care is not needed in casting with the May fly if
+you wish to fill your creel; but, all said and done, a bungling cast
+will often secure a good fish with that lure which would inevitably
+have put him down and scared him had he been feeding upon the ordinary
+flies. It is very noticeable nowadays how capricious the rise is.
+Indiscriminate weed cutting has almost entirely eradicated the May fly
+from some waters, and quite entirely on others--a boon to some minds,
+my own included, but a boon that bears sour fruit in other ways, for
+irregular and injudicious weed-cutting hits other fly food hard. It is
+curious, also, that in places where more judicious weed farming has
+been resorted to of late the May fly has begun to return, patchily and
+scantily enough, but nevertheless in increasing quantities every year.
+I would fain leave them to hatch out upon the Kennet and the Colne and
+similar waters, and leave our bonnie streams alone, but here there is
+no choice; if they come, they come, and we must make the best of them.
+
+A big rise of May fly is indeed a wonderful sight, the drakes flopping
+into your face, covering everything, seeming almost like a plague of
+locusts. Fat, luscious insects, enjoying to the full their brief spell
+of winged life, after having spent months in the larval state. See that
+one floating down-stream, airing and drying his wings, floating on his
+nymphal envelope. He is floating dangerously near that trout that has
+already annexed a goodly number of his fellows. Will he be taken too?
+No; he flutters off, clumsily enough, making for the shore, only to be
+swallowed by a hungry chaffinch. So his brief period of air life is
+over. And what a feast he and his congeners provide for the swallows,
+the finches, and other birds. Towards sunset, males and females of the
+green drake tribe float and flutter about in the air, make love and
+pair, then the female deposits her eggs on the water, and at last both
+fall on the river with outspread wings, forming what we call the spent
+gnat.
+
+The trout take heavy toll of the nymphæ rising upwards before they
+reach the water surface, and will not then look at a floating
+imitation; and when the act of reproduction is completed they feed
+greedily upon the empty shucks and the spent gnats. Altogether, our
+friend the May fly seems to spend a hazardous and somewhat inglorious
+life. Could he but see himself in his larval state, I feel sure he
+would lose his self-respect. He is then no beauty, and to grovel and
+lie low in the mud at the bed of the river for, as some say, two years,
+cannot form a very exciting kind of life; whilst if he escapes in
+the imago state, countless enemies lie in wait for him, and his very
+love-making costs him his life.
+
+The return of the May fly to a certain well-known chalk stream in
+Yorkshire seems to be an accomplished fact, though one not altogether
+to the satisfaction of the members of the club that fish its waters.
+This stream, known as the Driffield Beck, ranks high amongst kindred
+waters, the dry fly reigns supreme, the stream is as swift and even,
+the water as crystal clear, and the trout as fully educated as those
+of their brothers of the Itchen or Test. In former times the May fly
+hatched in countless numbers on this stream, and the Carnival used in
+those days to be reserved strictly for the members of the club; but
+whether it were attributable to over-cutting of the weeds, or to some
+other cause, the May fly died away entirely from the stream, and for
+many a season not a fly was hatched. We members of the club--a very
+old one, by the way--rather congratulated ourselves on this change,
+as, instead of gorged fish who would not look at a dun for weeks after
+the May fly period, we were treated to an even rise at the small fly
+throughout all the angling months. But two seasons before we had
+noticed, to our surprise, the advent of a few May flies. I recollect
+impaling one upon a hook and drifting it down cunningly over a good 2½
+lb. fish who had taken up his position under a thorn bush on my side
+of the river, and the scared bolt he made when it got to him and he
+had had a good look at it was a thing to remember. And, in fact, the
+few May flies which that year floated over fish in position made them
+all bolt as if they had been shot. Then in the next season there was a
+more considerable hatching of the fly, and in one spot in particular
+a few fish were taken with the green drake. The third year we arrived
+at the right time for the hatch, then a very local one on our stream;
+but in that particular part of the river there was a rise of May fly
+to satisfy the most gluttonous of those who love that form of angling.
+But the curious thing was the way in which the fish treated the fly.
+Every now and again the ½ lb. and ¾ lb. fish would take them boldly,
+and here and there a fish of that size would settle down to a regular
+feed, taking all within reach; but the heavier fish seemed to be
+thoroughly disinclined to take them. The bolder young ones now and
+again paid the penalty of their temerity, being consigned to the basket
+if fully 11 inches in length, or returned to the water if, as was too
+frequently the case, they were not sizeable. I do not pretend to any
+great experience of May fly fishing, though I have been a devoted
+dry-fly angler for many years; but I do not remember to have seen fish
+act so capriciously in my previous experiences. The birds, however--the
+warblers, chaffinches, &c.--were quite equal to the occasion, and took
+heavy toll of the _ephemeridæ_. I particularly noticed what I never
+remember to have seen before, _i.e._, a cock blackbird darting out of
+the bushes at intervals to secure a fluttering _Ephemera Danica_, and
+returning to his shelter to pick the luscious morsel to pieces at his
+leisure.
+
+My luck was not considerable; the rise of dun was insignificant, the
+wind was simply abhorrent, and my baskets, naturally, were not as
+heavy as I could have wished. The water was in perfect order, the fish
+abundant, but sport indifferent. One day I went up one of the upper
+feeding streams, where I had often, poor performer though I may be,
+secured a really good basket of good fish. After rising and pricking
+more than a dozen fish, all of which rose short, and turning over and
+getting a short run out of a three-pounder which had permanently taken
+up his position above a bridge by a garden-side under some sedges in
+a difficult position--rendered more difficult by the violence of the
+wind--I had to content myself with a poor brace of 1¼ pounders, going
+home feeling regretfully that I had done that day a good deal in the
+way of educating fish!
+
+The last day of my visit (June 10) I had somewhat of a more interesting
+experience. The wind was still high, though warmer, and, though no rain
+fell, there was a feeling that rain was not far off. The report that
+the May fly was up and in quantity had brought out a number of anglers,
+and when I got to the water-side, armed with a box of May flies given
+me by a prince among anglers, I found all the 'vantage spots (in the
+small extent of the water where the fly hatched in any quantity) duly
+occupied by an ardent angler ready for the fray. So I quietly gave that
+game up and retired to a small island between two branches of the river
+near the keeper's cottage. I had but a couple of hundred yards to fish,
+while the ground where I was standing was sedge covered elbow-high with
+charmingly and conveniently placed bushes here and there behind me,
+ready to hitch up any fly that, in the backward cast, should be driven
+by the wind into their embrace. The only chance was to keep up a kind
+of steeple cast, as the stream was a fair width across. The charm of
+the position, however, was that on the other side was a high bank with
+a plantation on it, which shed a welcome shade over the bank fish on
+that side. It was very difficult to locate a rise, but the stream was
+even and there was no drag. Nor was it an easy matter to land a fish,
+as the fringe of sedges was wide and thick, and the water deep; my
+landing-net was also over-short--a bad fault--and caused me to lose
+three good fish, one well over 2 lb. I spent nearly all the day on this
+place, and managed to hook every fish I saw rise, and that was not a
+great number, the rise of dun being so small and the wind blowing them
+off the river almost as soon as they started on their swim down-stream.
+However, I managed to land five fish, all on a 000 gold-ribbed hare's
+ear, the best one 1 lb. 9 oz. and the smallest a little over a pound;
+but as they were all in the pink of condition, and each fish was a
+problem to get, I enjoyed the day far more than a more prolific one,
+when the duns might be sailing steadily, the fish all in position, and
+where catching them would be far more of a certainty, and where even a
+duffer could not have failed to score.
+
+Perhaps I may have been somewhat unfortunate in my May fly experiences,
+and most anglers would be disinclined to agree with my faint
+appreciation of this insect and of the sport he assists to produce.
+Most of my friends speak of this form of angling in a totally different
+strain, therefore, presumably, I must be wrong in my view. To me,
+however, the May fly (as a means to an end) is of great value in
+tempting up the bigger cannibal fish, but as an adjunct to sport, I am
+inclined to consider him overrated.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+THE EVENING RISE.
+
+
+HAVING recorded my heterodox views about May fly fishing, I fear I
+shall run counter to the opinions of many if I venture to state my
+ideas relative to the evening rise. For my part I find it, in the main,
+vanity and vexation of spirit.
+
+Doubtless, in the hot days of July and August, when rivers appear,
+under sultry conditions, to be almost tenantless, when after, say, 3
+p.m., you may watch for all you are worth without seeing a dimple or
+a rise, it is some consolation to go home for a little rest and an
+early meal, intending to avail yourself of the evening chances with
+a possible brace or so of fish to save, maybe, coming in clean. Eyes
+tired with the glare of the water are grateful for the rest, and with
+the proverbial hope rising freely in the angler's bosom, you mentally
+reckon up the big captures you are going to make in the short time
+afforded by the evening rise.
+
+Refreshed in mind and body, you regain your favourite spot at 7 or 7.30
+p.m., and the evening seems to promise well. It does not look as if
+those cruel mists would begin to rise at sundown; there is little or
+no wind; the hatch of fly throughout the day has been insignificant;
+surely there must be a good rise this evening, everything seems to
+foreshadow it. You take up your station and watch the water carefully,
+especially the one or two spots near the opposite bank that you know
+full well ought to be occupied by good fish. A few spinners hatch out
+and dance merrily about; the gnats hover purposely up and down; an
+odd dun sails down ignored, as far as the fish are concerned, and at
+length, freeing himself from the water, gains the bank side. Surely
+that was a rising fish by the bank of rushes yonder? But the shadow of
+the rushes thrown by the lowered sun prevents you from locating him
+exactly. It was a floppy rise, probably caused by some small fish.
+Something must be done, for the time is short; so, letting out your
+line to the required length, you despatch your olive to sail down the
+bank of rushes. No response. Another trial provokes a rise, and you are
+fast in the fish; but, as anticipated, he proves to be a half-pounder,
+and, handling him gently, after having removed the fly, which was
+provokingly well fixed in his tongue, you carefully hold him in the
+water until he has regained his wind and recovered from his exhaustion.
+Whilst so engaged you hear a heavy splash to your right. Hastily
+glancing up, you cannot locate that rise either, but it is something
+that they are beginning. No sedges have appeared, so you retain your
+olive. A good quiet mid-stream boil above you attracts your attention.
+That fellow means business, anyhow. Your olive, however, though deftly
+offered, sails over his position unnoticed and despised. You change
+to a bigger fly, a 00 red quill; the light is still good. He refuses
+that equally, and whilst you are doubting whether to change or no, up
+he comes again. What is he taking? Some small fly, no doubt, but none
+that you can see. Try him with a hare's ear. You change, and whilst
+you are tying on the fly you hear a succession of floppy rises below
+you. You somewhat undecidedly give the trout one more chance, but
+half-heartedly, as you want to get down to those other fish--result, a
+bad cast, effectually putting down our friend.
+
+[Illustration: THE SEDGE HOUR.]
+
+The light is beginning to go, so you re-change to your bigger red
+quill and try your luck with those below you. Fly after fly, carefully
+placed, cocked and floating, produces but little result, one pounder
+succumbing. You see he is not a big one, and give him scant grace,
+meaning to get him into the net as soon as possible, and so bring him
+in half done. The net somewhat too hurriedly shown him produces an
+effort on his part, and he has weeded you. You spike your rod and try
+hand-lining; he does not seem to yield, and you are impatient, and
+resume your rod. Something must go; you have no time to lose. Suddenly
+with a wriggle he extricates himself from the weed, to your infinite
+astonishment, and he is then soon brought to book. But many precious
+minutes have been wasted; the fly has got itself fixed in one of the
+knots in your landing net. Never mind, break it off; you must get to
+sterner business. So you take some few more minutes in threading the
+eye of a small, dark sedge fly, as the fish by now must be at work
+upon the larger flies. Flop! flop! on the opposite side, under the
+shadow of the reeds. See that your fly is dry and cocks well; keep out
+of sight--an absolute essential in evening fishing--and go for that
+uppermost fish. That was a good rise; was it at your fly? It is hard
+to see by the waning light. Evidently not. Try him again. This time he
+rises well, and you are fast in him; but you struck too heavily; he was
+a good fish, and you have left your fly in him, bad luck to it!
+
+This time you have to make use of a match to enable you to thread the
+eye, but after some fumbling struggles you at last succeed. One more
+try. Pity you had not put on a somewhat stouter cast, but it is too
+late now. You must be a bit more gentle with them; a slight turn of the
+wrist is all you want. There is a good rise, just beyond mid-stream,
+and a good cast just four inches above the rise. You can see your fly,
+and also the neb of a good trout as he breaks the water to suck him in.
+Now gently does it! He is hooked, and goes careering up stream to the
+tune of the song of the reel. Steady him now; don't let him get into
+the rushes. The light is fast going, and you are inclined to hurry him.
+Better be cautious; his tail looked broad as he turned over that time;
+he is fat and in lusty condition, and has no intention of surrendering
+his life without a good struggle. Don't show him the net; that last run
+must have settled him; he flops on the surface; he is gently led into
+the mouth of the net, and is yours. Not so big as you fancied, by any
+means; might be 1½ lb.; you put him down as well over 2 lb. He is well
+hooked, and after taking the fly from his mouth you grip him well and
+give his head a good hard tap against the handle of your landing net;
+in so doing he slips from your grasp and nearly flops into the river.
+Hurriedly you put yourself between him and the water and get hold of
+him, making sure of him this time, and he goes into your bag. Is there
+still light for one more? Hardly, and it is no pleasure when you cannot
+see your fly.
+
+You take up your rod again, and pass your hand down the line and cast.
+Where is that fly? Caught up somewhere in your struggles with the
+trout. It is engagingly fixed in your coat, about the small of your
+back. So you lay your rod down again, take off your coat, and extricate
+your fly with your knife at the cost of some of the cloth of your coat.
+Pack up your things and trudge home somewhat annoyed with yourself
+and thinking of the opportunities you had lost, and determining next
+evening to have some points of gut attached to suitable flies in your
+cap, ready for the fray--no more threading eyes under such adverse
+conditions for you.
+
+Next evening you repair to the place where you know the big trout
+lie and are sure to rise well. Fully equipped in every detail, and
+determined not to be induced to hurry, but to take things quietly and
+composedly, you reach your station. What is that in the meadow over
+there? A mist, by Jove! And soon the aforesaid mist begins to rise on
+the water, most effectually stopping all hope of sport; so reluctantly
+you leave the water side, a sadder and a wiser man, reflecting that the
+evening rise is by no means the certainty you had fondly hoped.
+
+Of course it is not always so. I recollect one evening on the Test,
+when, after a hot day with scarce a semblance of a feeding fish, except
+tailers, there was a grand evening rise, and on a big red quill I got
+seven fish, almost from the same spot, in little over a quarter of an
+hour; but these days are too infrequent to alter my stated opinion
+that the evening rise is an overrated pleasure, and generally produces
+vexation of spirit.
+
+If you do fish in the evening hours, recollect that you must be just
+as cautious in approaching fish as if it were broad daylight; that any
+sign of drag will as effectually put a fish down as in the earlier
+hours. Your fly must float and cock as jauntily as in the morning, but
+you lose the chief charm of fishing the floating fly, namely, that
+you cannot spot your fish in the water and watch their movements; you
+have to cast at a rise, or where you imagine a rise to have been.
+Use a small fly at first and then a little later change to a big red
+quill, or, if the sedge flies are out, to a small dark sedge. You can
+afford to have a point of stronger gut, for you will have often to
+play a fish pretty hard, and they don't appear to be so gut shy as the
+evening closes in. But as soon as you can no longer see your sedge fly
+on the water, reel up. Fishing in the dark is no true sport, and it is
+uncommonly near to poaching.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+"JACK."
+
+
+THE upper waters of the Bourne and Test flow through Hurstbourne, Lord
+Portsmouth's beautiful park, and were tenanted until a few years ago by
+portly trout of aldermanic weight and size. It was found, however, that
+they proved too costly to be retained, as the toll they took of the
+smaller fish was prodigious, and out of proportion to their value. They
+were accordingly captured by degrees, and replaced by a more numerous
+colony of smaller fish. It used to be a grand sight to watch the big
+fellows lying in the quick water near the big stone bridge, or chasing
+the pounders with angry rushes.
+
+When I knew the water, some ten or twelve years ago, there were still a
+few of these goodly-proportioned fish remaining. They were well-known,
+and each one had his nickname. Thus one was known as "Jack"; he
+almost invariably lay in a narrow outlet to a culvert that led the
+surplus water from the pool above under the roadway into the pool
+below the bridge. For the greater portion of its length the water ran
+underground, emerging from the culvert some two or three yards from the
+river. The ground on either side at the end of the culvert was fully
+three feet above the water, the banks being nearly vertical, while
+the stream at the culvert's mouth was only about a foot wide. In this
+narrow gully or channel lay Jack, his nose being only a few inches from
+the masonry. Any unwary footfall speedily dislodged him from his little
+bay into the main stream, but by crawling up warily he could be seen
+and admired.
+
+Many had tried to secure him by fair fishing, but though once or twice
+hooked he had so far got off scot free. Nor was his post an easy one to
+attack; the water was, of course, gin-clear, very narrow, and also very
+shallow. The slightest sign of gut--and he was off.
+
+On a lovely summer morning--to be accurate, the 26th of June, 1893--my
+dear old friend Harry Maxwell and I had fished up from the bee-hive,
+past the cascade, and were nearing the bridge with rather more than
+average success, and had decided to eat our luncheon on the bankside,
+under the friendly shade of the bridge. It was, however, barely
+half-past twelve--too early, we agreed, for lunch--so Maxwell went up a
+little to fish the shallow above, and I elected to have a try for Jack,
+as I had reconnoitred and found him to be occupying his accustomed
+corner. As the river was rather low, and as bright as only a chalk
+stream can be, I decided to break through my general rule and put on
+two lengths of the finest drawn gut, feeling that in this instance any
+natural gut, however fine, would be out of the question.
+
+I was careful to draw the gut through a bunch of weed, to diminish the
+glare; the Whitchurch dun was on the water, and its counterfeit had
+already secured us some fair fish, but for some reason or other I was
+impelled to select a small 000 pale watery dun, called the Driffield
+dun, for my lure. After carefully testing my line and cast I waded out
+into the heavy stream, opposite to and commanding the outlet of Jack's
+bay.
+
+Knowing that there was little hope of dropping my fly at the desired
+spot without giving my friend a glimpse of the gut, after a preliminary
+cast or two, to make sure of my distance, I sent off my fly on its
+errand, intending to pitch it on the grass just above the culvert. The
+first cast, fortunately, went right, and by a gentle tap or two on the
+butt of my rod I dislodged the fly from the grass, and it fluttered
+down airily in front of Master Jack, the fine gut never having touched
+the water. No sooner had it done so than Jack had it. Fortunately
+I did not strike too hard, as one is so liable to do under such
+circumstances; just the requisite turn of the wrist and the small hook
+went home.
+
+Before I had time to realise fully what had happened the fish had
+bolted from his holt into the main stream, a bag of unavoidable line
+behind him as he charged straight towards me. On regaining touch with
+him I found that the hook had still firm hold, and that Jack was
+boring up for the bridge in the heavy water. Naturally, I had no idea
+of allowing him to thread his way up through the arch, as I could ill
+follow him there, so I had to keep up as steady and strong a strain as
+I dared. He soon had enough of that fun, and down he came at express
+speed past me, leaving me to get in my line by hand as best I could.
+By good luck, I was able to get the slack reeled up whilst Jack was
+careering about in the broader water below me. Hardly had I done so
+when, at the end of his run, he gave a grand leap, after the fashion of
+a sea trout; a dip of rod-point to his majesty saved a catastrophe, and
+I now began to try to reach terra firma. My friend, however, was not
+at all disposed to give me much time for such an operation, and just
+as I was trying to regain the bank--a sufficiently ticklish operation
+with a wild fish held only by the finest of drawn gut--he made a most
+determined rush for the big bed of flags below the bridge. Once let him
+attain that stronghold and I was fairly done; so I had once more to
+test my gut, and resolutely to determine that he should obey my will.
+Better be broke at once than lose him in that weed bed. Once more he
+gave way, and I was able to regain the bank. At that moment Maxwell
+turned up for luncheon, and the fish, now absolutely beaten, was
+successfully netted out. I found that in his mad rushes and gyrations
+he had managed to get two full turns of the gut round his gills. This
+no doubt accounted for his coming to bank so speedily. He weighed just
+over 3¼ lb.--no great monster after all, you may ejaculate, but he was
+about the most perfect specimen of a trout I have ever seen, and was
+in the pink of condition. He now graces my study in a glass case, the
+only specimen of a fish that I have ever set up. But there was some
+justification for this temporary mental aberration, and I often now
+look at him and recall his sporting end, and the difficult conditions
+under which I managed to capture him. He carries back my mind to the
+fond recollections of my old friend, now no more, one of the best and
+most unselfish of anglers, whose untimely loss has left a blank among
+his many friends that cannot be filled.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+WEED CUTTING.
+
+
+ALL dry fly anglers owe a deep grudge to modern sub-soil drainage,
+which hurries, helter skelter, all the rain that falls into the
+river, thus doing away with the former gentle soakage into the soil,
+which served to feed our springs and keep up an even flow and an even
+head of water. Now we have but alternations of flood and emptiness;
+the millers, moreover, suffering from these alterations, and sadly
+lacking water in most seasons, cry out loudly against any obstacle
+in the river-bed; consequently the river weeds are ruthlessly and
+unscientifically cut away. The weeds, the natural nurseries of
+fish food, being thus reduced in quantity, the supply of food is
+seriously compromised, holts for the fish are destroyed, bare areas
+of river bed--on which moving one fish means possibly the moving of
+scores--afford neither refuge nor shelter, and become practically
+impossible to fish. All fish need shelter in the hot weather from the
+summer sun, all need refuges to which to resort if scared; take these
+away and the result must be deplorable.
+
+Those amongst us who have had the privilege of fishing in waters
+where the cutting of the weeds has been scientifically and wisely
+performed will have realised the difference this point alone can make
+to a fishery. All the details of weed and water-farming have been so
+exhaustively treated by Mr. Halford in his various works on "Dry fly
+fishing," that they need not be described here. No better mentor could
+be chosen. But some of the chief points that ought to be had in mind
+may be touched upon. The chief desiderata, where there is an ample
+supply of weed, are, to put the matter very shortly, to cut in the
+deeper parts of the river lanes along both banks some ten feet wide,
+and in the shallower parts to cut bars or lanes across the water at
+right angles to the banks. At the same time lanes should, also, be cut
+parallel to the banks, to encourage the bank fish. Where weed is not
+in abundance recourse must be had to artificial shelters, or hides,
+under which the fish can obtain the shelter that they require. Stakes
+driven into the river bed soon attract a clinging mass of floating
+weed, the only drawback to their being used is that hooked fish may be
+lost through their bolting for and round them. Piles driven into the
+shallows afford a welcome rest to fish, and it will be found that a
+trout will nearly always take up his position behind them. Similarly,
+big stones placed in the shallows will have a beneficial effect.
+
+The constant and irregular cutting of weeds has, moreover, a very
+trying effect both upon the sport and the temper of an angler. Huge
+masses of weed floating down, just at the moment when the hatch of fly,
+so patiently waited for, is in full swing, and the fish in the mood
+to take them, will sorely tax our powers of self-control. How often
+has such a state of things extracted from us a "swear word"! These
+very weeds may, nevertheless, be made to serve a useful purpose. There
+is a fine fish lying a yard or so from the opposite bank; the stream
+between us is heavy and quick; over the fish is an oily glide of water,
+the pace of the stream being checked by friction with the river bank.
+On this the duns float steadily, led by the stream into its embrace.
+Our friend the trout knows this full well, and therefore persistently
+takes up his station at that spot. We have often tried for him, but the
+pace of the stream between us, stand where we will, has always beaten
+us: no sooner has our well-cocked fly sailed into the head of the
+glide than it is hurried across it, leaving a most unnatural trail, or
+wake, behind it such as no living insect ever made. This trail of the
+serpent, or "drag" as it is called, is one of the greatest difficulties
+that we have to cope with in angling with the floating fly. It is,
+like the poor, always with us. But the very weeds we have been so
+persistently abusing may be brought into our service to overcome it.
+Watch a mass of floating weed that is about to be carried over the
+position of your fish, throw your fly so that the gut lies on the
+advancing weed; the fly, with some inches of free gut, should rest upon
+the water in front of the weed; the rest of your cast, being supported
+by the weed, will be freed from the drag of the stream, and the fly
+will float proudly over the fish. Unsuspecting he rises, sucks the fly
+down in absolute confidence, and at last he is yours. Backwaters may
+be overcome in a similar manner, and to this slight extent the curse
+of the floating masses of weed may be converted into a real boon. This
+slight advantage cannot be considered as counterbalancing the drawback
+of indiscriminate weed cutting, it is merely an attempt to turn to our
+use an otherwise unmitigated evil.
+
+Proprietors of valuable fishing rights are strangely unappreciative of
+the advantages of scientific weed cutting and weed growing; they seem
+to be inclined to let matters take their course, and in consequence
+suffer considerably, and until they realise what this carelessness
+means to them things will be allowed to go on in the old groove.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+THE ANGLER AND AMBIDEXTERITY.
+
+
+IT has always been an enigma to me why, having been endowed by
+Providence with two hands, we should knowingly and deliberately
+minimise the boon. All ranks and conditions of men, be their
+occupations what they may, are affected. The nerves, sinews, and powers
+of our left hands are equally as efficient and valuable as those of our
+right hands; or, more strictly speaking, would be so if we only gave
+them half a chance. Who has not experienced the difficulty of folding
+a tie, tying a knot, or even buttoning a collar or a boot, &c., when
+the right hand has been temporarily incapacitated? And who, except
+the ambidextrous man, would be bold enough to shave himself entirely
+with the left hand? Injure a man's right hand, and you render him
+practically useless. Of all the arts, music alone trains both hands
+equally; in some trades, such as cotton weaving, spinning, &c., the
+left hands do their proper share of the work.
+
+Consider for a moment the amount of wastage there is in manual work
+alone through this premeditated reduction of effective power! We
+seem to be content, apparently, to halve our powers, and this for no
+useful purpose whatever. The very children, who naturally would be
+ambidextrous, are chidden and checked by their parents if, following a
+natural instinct, they take up a pencil or a spoon in their left hands;
+and so on through their school days, and even after, each and every
+attempt to make a proper use of their left hand is sternly reproved,
+until at last the poor unused and untaught left hands and arms become
+of very secondary importance. Is there any phase of life in which
+ambidexterity would not be a factor of the greatest value? Would it not
+be a priceless boon equally to the soldier, the surgeon, the engineer,
+the craftsman, the clerk, or the artisan? And does not the same apply
+in the domain of sport? In shooting, would you not be at an advantage
+if you could shoot equally from either shoulder? The fisherman--how
+would it favour him? I unhesitatingly answer that it would aid him in
+every branch of his sport.
+
+What angler amongst us could tie a Turle knot, or even thread an eyed
+fly, left-handed? We should fumble and fume, and probably give it up
+in despair. To the dry-fly fisherman the advantage that would accrue
+through equality of arms and hands would simply mean a duplication of
+effective power. Think of the countless occasions when an overhanging
+tree or obtrusive bush has rendered a right-hand cast difficult, if
+not impossible. In one position in particular a left-hand cast is of
+extreme value. It enables you to command the water under your own bank
+without having recourse to an awkward and always precarious back-handed
+cast.
+
+You are carefully stalking your way up stream, the wind perhaps blowing
+towards your own bank, the left bank of the river. About twenty yards
+above you there is an overhanging tussock of grass with fringing blades
+hanging over the stream. Near this tussock, or a little above it, you
+note the dimple of a feeding trout; he is in a position where all the
+duns are brought quietly sailing past his vantage post. A well-cocked
+fly must inevitably secure him. You watch the duns one by one taken by
+him; he is feeding steadily, and seems to be a good fish. To reach him
+you have to cast with the right hand over the left shoulder. It is ten
+to one that, if the length of cast is correct, the fly will be guided,
+partly by the wind and partly by your arm, into the fringing grasses.
+If it can be snatched off without scaring your trout, well and good;
+but sooner or later, unless a particularly happy cast overcomes the
+difficulty, you are bound to be hung up in the aforesaid tussock so
+firmly as to necessitate a careful crawl to try and disengage your fly.
+If you can free the fly without scaring the trout, well, you are so
+far a lucky man. You either then recommence your struggle with adverse
+circumstances, or more probably give him up as a bad job. Use your
+left hand and arm, if you can, and the cast becomes a perfectly simple
+one. Every dry-fly angler, moreover, knows full well how soon constant
+casting and drying the fly tires and cramps the wrist and arm. What a
+relief, then, to rest your right hand and give your left a chance.
+
+Nature has a wonderful recuperative power, and will reassert herself
+provided you allow her to do so. The reacquisition of normal left-hand
+dexterity is by no means difficult; a little assiduous practice,
+despite the first feeling of awkwardness, will soon encourage you
+to persevere. Practise on the lawn at a saucer, and in varying
+conditions of wind, before the season commences; you will not only gain
+additional interest in your casting, but will have acquired an asset of
+considerable value.
+
+Not long ago, commenting upon what it was pleased to call the "latest
+craze," viz., ambidexterity, an evening paper made merry over the
+subject, and declared that there were enough awkward single-handed
+men in the world without seeking to add an army of still more awkward
+double-handed men. Such chaff may provoke a passing smile, but no chaff
+will ever detract one iota from the value of double-handedness, and I
+most strongly urge all anglers, old or young, to devote some little
+time and attention to the acquirement of this most useful, though so
+long neglected, bi-manual dexterity.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+LOCH FISHING.
+
+
+LOCH fishing for trout is carried on for the most part amidst glorious
+and romantic scenery. There is a sense of repose in the drifting boat
+and the rhythmical cast. As a means of recreation and enjoyment it has
+a distinct place in the affections of many of its votaries, and that
+they are numbered by thousands the records of Loch Leven will amply
+testify. To the overworked man, to those who are debarred from active
+pedestrian exercise, this method of angling has a peculiar charm. To
+the thronging multitudes of big Scottish cities (such as Glasgow, for
+instance) the frequent competitions upon Loch Lomond or Loch Ard offer
+a change of scene and environment that is simply invaluable, whilst
+the ozone imbibed in such surroundings acts as an antidote to the
+smoke-laden air to which their lungs are ordinarily subjected.
+
+[Illustration: A DRY FLY DAY ON LOCH ARD.]
+
+But when all is said and done, to the ardent angler it forms but a
+monotonous kind of enjoyment. There is something so mechanical in the
+constant casting of your collar of three or four flies on the chance
+that some fish may take one of them. The row across the loch, the drift
+over the same ground, repeated constantly are apt to pall. Doubtless
+skill will assert itself in the long run, and every Scottish or Irish
+loch has its record breakers, men who can be relied upon to hold their
+own against all comers; but the novice and the bungler will often
+succeed where more experienced anglers fail. Perhaps the stream angler
+is too apt to work his flies to the top of the water, whilst the
+novice, perforce, lets them sink; and, as a rule, the deeper you sink
+your flies, within reason, and the less you play them, the better.
+There is yet one more drawback to loch fishing, and that is, that you
+are entirely at the mercy of the wind--or, rather, of the want of wind.
+A still, glassy surface, and your boat fisherman is done. May that not
+be because he is wedded to his three or four flies fished wet? Let him
+try a dry fly under such circumstances; not necessarily on the ordinary
+banks he is wont to fish so sedulously, but rather in the bays and
+creeks and shallowing water amongst the rushes.
+
+On one occasion, about four years ago, I was in Perthshire, on the
+side of Loch Ard--that sweet loch, more beautiful in some respects
+than far-famed Loch Katrine. It was in early May. A big competition
+from busy Glasgow had put fourteen boats upon the loch, and some
+eight-and-twenty men were ready with double-handed and single-handed
+rods to measure their skill against each other. It was a lovely day,
+not a ripple upon the water. Ben Lomond's tops were reflected in the
+glassy mirror, so that it was hard to tell which was the original and
+which the mirrored counterfeit. For some hours these boats had, with
+precise and repeated regularity, drifted across the best ground without
+the semblance of a rise, only to be rowed round again to follow in the
+same procession. There is no doubt that their occupants were sternly
+in earnest, and would leave no chance untried. A faint catspaw of a
+ripple might secure a rise, or perchance a fish, but catspaws were
+few and far between. Hour after hour the rods were plied with stolid
+monotony, responseless and unnoticed. And, as the day wore on to noon,
+the conditions remained unvaried, and the catspaws even ceased to add a
+temporary and evanescent interest.
+
+About that time--noon--I, having nothing in particular to do, took one
+of the gillies with me in a boat across the loch. He was astonished to
+see me take a rod, and no doubt put me down as a mad-brained Sassenach.
+Nevertheless I took my little cane-built Pope rod and a box of Test
+flies I happened to have with me, and we pulled up the loch and into
+one of the bays at the far end. There I bade him rest on his oars, as
+we were slowly drifting along the scanty rushes that grew out of the
+bed of the loch. I soon saw a fish or two move--at what I could not
+make out--so, taking an oar and gently using it as a paddle, I moved
+along until I could locate an exact rise, and I noticed a small fly
+near where the rise had been. Using the blade of my oar as a ladle I
+annexed the insect, and found it to be a small green beetle. In my box
+I found a small Coch-y-bondhu, which had a red tag and a peacock herl
+body. My scissors soon removed the red tag, and then I fancied it might
+do as a coarse representation of the Simon Pure. Having tied it on, I
+cast it dry at the ring of the next rise. It was instantly taken, and
+a plump ¾ lb. Loch Leven trout was soon in the net. And so it went on;
+a cast here or there at the rises amidst the rushes, and in a short
+hour and a quarter seven good trout had paid the penalty. We then rowed
+home for luncheon, and, on inquiry, I found afterwards that the united
+efforts of some twenty-eight men, all as keen as mustard, had produced
+three fish.
+
+Does not this tell a tale of lost opportunities, and of the folly of
+being wedded to one style of angling? Had there been a good fresh
+breeze my dry fly would have been nowhere in competition with my
+eight-and-twenty friends. The best fisherman is the best all-round
+fisherman, able and willing to adapt himself to the circumstances in
+which he may be placed. But how little of this dry-fly work is tried
+upon our numerous lochs?--not a breath of wind, no good to fish! Yet
+ripples here and there are breaking the surface, showing that the fish
+are feeding.
+
+Many pleasant half-hours have I had on the same loch, after dinner,
+under the rising moon, at the season when the main object of life is
+the grouse shooting. On a mid-August evening, after a hot day, the
+loch looks deliciously cool. Let us try our luck after dinner. We
+take our rods, and put up for choice a small gold-ribbed hare's ear.
+Let us get into that bay, in our boat, with our backs to the shelving
+shore and the moon before us. There is a good rise. Paddle gently, but
+quickly, near it; judge your distance accurately, keeping your eye on
+the very centre of the now expanded rings. You pitch it accurately, and
+it floats like a cork. Don't hurry to take it off--loch fish cruise
+about--he may see it. I thought so; a good rise and well hooked, and
+the pound Loch Leven fish merrily runs out your line. Now you've turned
+him. Don't let him get under the boat. He has run past you into the
+shadows, as that splash fully indicated. You can't see your line, nor
+where he is. Never mind, keep his head up, and, above all things,
+keep him away from the boat until he is done. He fights well, but the
+contest is a very one-sided one; he cannot beat you as his brother of
+the river often can, and in due course he is netted.
+
+Now dry your fly well; or, better still, put on that other hare's ear
+you have already mounted upon a point of gut. We have rather disturbed
+this water; let us move a bit further up the bank. The rises are
+sadly infrequent, perhaps, but a brace of good fish taken under such
+circumstances is worth catching, especially as the loch is generally
+considered to be an early one, and the fishing to end in June for all
+practical purposes. If only you will try it, this floating fly work
+will add a very great interest to your enjoyment of your lovely loch.
+
+Perhaps I may be treating this subject somewhat too cavalierly, and
+unduly emphasising my own views and predilections. Certainly I am free
+to admit that I have enjoyed many pleasant days on our Scottish lochs.
+One particular day stands out pre-eminently in my recollections. I was
+staying at a shooting lodge near Pitlochry, and the famous Loch Broom
+was within the precincts of our moor. To reach it we had a longish walk
+and stiff climb, as it lies on the far side of a high, saddle-backed
+line of hills. There were three boats on the loch, and one of them
+belonged to my host.
+
+I was told that it was heavily stocked with good fish, but that a
+strong breeze was necessary if good results were to be obtained. In
+due course a gillie and I sallied forth one morning, somewhat late
+in the season, armed with rods, tackle, and flies, to see what Loch
+Broom would do for us. There certainly promised to be an ample supply
+of wind to start with, and, as the day wore on, it had no tendency
+whatever to go down, but rather to increase unduly; and when we reached
+the loch side after our six or seven mile walk, we found miniature
+foam-crested billows on its surface; in fact, rather more than we had
+bargained for. The boat had been merely grounded in the rushes at the
+loch side, and required baling out and adjusting. Intending to lose no
+time, I speedily put up my rod and my cast of three flies and placed
+it in the stern of the boat in order to soak the cast, then devoting
+my attention to the assistance of the gillie, who was getting the
+boat in readiness. Whilst I was doing so my reel began to screech, and
+I found I had hooked a good trout, my cast of flies having apparently
+been dancing over the wind-swept waves. It was certainly a good augury
+of what was to come. After a good deal of trouble we got our boat
+launched, and, though leaking a bit, it was in a floatable state. The
+wind was too high to admit of a slow drift across the little loch, but
+it did not much matter.
+
+At every cast there were rises, not at one of the flies, but often at
+all three--no skill was required. The fish were rampant, and would be
+hooked. In fact, the main part of the fun lay in seeing how often one
+could land two fish hooked simultaneously. We only made three drifts in
+all, for it is easy to be surfeited with such sport. After our third
+drift was finished and the boat was hauled up again into its place we
+had leisure to count the slain; they were certainly very numerous. I
+somewhat reluctantly transcribe the entry in my fishing diary lest the
+tale may be set down as a "fisherman's story." They amounted in all to
+ninety-two, and weighed between 40 and 50 lb. It certainly was a record
+day for even that prolific loch. There is yet one more entry in the
+same fishing log to the effect that the 15 odd pounds weight of trout
+that I personally carried home that afternoon formed a considerable
+addition to the labour of the walk over the hills and against the gale,
+and that I frequently wished them at Jericho.
+
+But you might go to Loch Broom on a still day and you would be almost
+inclined to declare that it was untenanted, so fickle in their
+behaviour are these selfsame trout.
+
+There is a little loch--Loch Dhu--in Forfarshire, high up in the hollow
+of the hills, tenanted by many little black trout, who refuse to be
+beguiled by the artificial fly. I tried it once or twice whilst grouse
+shooting at Rottal, but with the poorest results. One day, very early
+in the morning, I was going up the hill with my rifle and glass in the
+hope of getting a stalk at a red deer before our grouse drive began.
+On my way up I passed within half to three-quarters of a mile of Loch
+Dhu, and happened to notice a strange turmoil on its usually unruffled
+surface. Bringing my glass to bear upon it, I discovered the cause. A
+swarm of bees was crossing the loch, a few inches above the surface,
+and apparently every one of the little black tenants of the water was
+engaged in gymnastic attempts to secure some of the bees by leaping
+bodily out of the water. The constant rising of the fish followed the
+swarm accurately across the loch, and only ceased when it reached terra
+firma. Then all again was silence and solitude. I certainly never tried
+afterwards to catch them with a solitary bee as a lure, and I fear
+that it would have required a whole swarm of artificial bees to arouse
+sufficiently the predatory instincts of these particular fish.
+
+There exists in Perthshire, on Ben Venue side, snugly ensconced in a
+beautiful hollow below the lower tops, a lochan, or small loch, by
+name Loch Tinkler--why so called this deponent knoweth not. Round
+its heather-covered sides I have shot many a grouse, and enjoyed the
+great pleasure of watching favourite setters and pointers--those
+delightful companions of the now somewhat old-fashioned form of grouse
+shooting--point and back, with unfailing accuracy. Hither I have not
+infrequently resorted with my rod for an hour or so of fishing along
+its shores. The loch is very irregular in shape, and has frequent
+heather-clad promontories jutting out into its waters, which permit
+the angler to cover the fish more effectually, and seldom have I gone
+unrewarded. Of no great size or weight, a half-pounder being perhaps
+above the average, the Loch Leven trout that tenant it attain wonderful
+condition and brilliancy of colouring. They play well, and I should be
+more than ungrateful were I not to record the pleasant hours I have
+spent there. But, after all, a small loch such as this is, commanded as
+it is for all practical purposes from the shore, hardly falls under the
+category of loch fishing, a branch of angling which presupposes the use
+of a boat.
+
+Owing, no doubt, to my peculiar temperament, I fear that I am not
+worthy of loch fishing proper. The thraldom of being confined for long
+periods in a boat, the unvarying monotony of the cast, are apt to pall
+upon me; and sooner or later, or, to be strictly accurate, sooner
+rather than later, I long to be ashore again, even though it be only to
+fish up a small Highland burn.
+
+And perhaps I am not quite alone in this respect, for I note that my
+friend who has given us those pleasant "Autumns in Argyleshire" asserts
+(p. 182) that he would prefer "indifferent sport in a river or burn to
+fishing the finest loch in the Highlands." So that if I err I do so in
+the very best of company.
+
+And this same burn fishing has always had a charm for me. It is passing
+pleasant to wander with a small 9 ft. rod up the rocky bed, casting
+your fly into that miniature salmon pool or into that quaint stickle,
+whose larger stones shelter the little denizens of the stream, which,
+for their size, fight like little demons, sportive, hungry, diminutive
+specimens of the race that produces their bulky Test and Itchen
+brethren. One makes one's way over the rocky bed, under the birches
+and the rowan trees, watching the grouse, the black game, or maybe the
+roe deer silently creeping up, at peace with all the world, just as
+intent upon the capture of the little fellows as if they were salmon.
+The creel soon fills if the day be at all suitable. Their rocky home
+affords little enough of insect food, as their miniature forms testify;
+but look at them closely; how perfect their form, how beautiful their
+colouring.
+
+A sandwich and a pipe give you all you require in the way of lunch; the
+whole day is your own, to do as you like with. Freed from all care, you
+are intent only on enjoying to the full the beauties of Nature that
+so lavishly surround you. Such quiet, gentle sport cannot but have
+a purifying and ennobling influence if you interpret aright all the
+beauty of creation. And it may be that interpretation is not needed; it
+is enough to _feel_ that one has a place in so fair a world.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+DAPPING FOR TROUT.
+
+
+THIS form of angling has been brought to a fine art in Ireland, and
+on many Irish loughs, in the May fly season, the heaviest trout are
+brought to book by means of the natural insect and the blow line. The
+columns of the _Field_ newspaper testify every year to the efficacy of
+dapping, and, without doubt, many a heavy fish that otherwise would
+only live to prey upon its smaller brethren is thus accounted for.
+
+We do not all of us have leisure or opportunity to test these Irish
+waters, or this particular form of sport with the blow line; but many
+of us come across deep, heavy runs of water, overhung with continuous
+branches, where the heavy trout lie, unapproachable and unvanquished,
+to become gross and even pike-like in the carnivorous and cannibalistic
+form of life.
+
+Such fish are well worth catching, if you can get them, and far better
+out of the stream than in it. Wise in their own generation, they take
+up their holt in places where casting is impossible with an ordinary
+fly, and where, could you by any possibility get one out, your fly
+would remain almost immovable in the sluggish deeps and overhung holes.
+The problem is then presented to you as to how their capture can best
+be effected. This is your opportunity for trying dapping; and although,
+to my unorthodox mind, such fishing is parlously near akin to poaching,
+yet the accomplishment of their capture is so eminently desirable that
+the end fully justifies the means.
+
+'Twas in the lower reaches of such a stream, not many miles from
+Bassenthwaite Water, that a certain number of leviathan cannibals had
+taken up their station. The stream was so tortuous and overhung that no
+boat could be manoeuvred through it, and a carefully constructed raft,
+with anchor astern, had been tried and come to signal grief, pitching
+its unfortunate occupant unceremoniously into an unsolicited cold bath,
+from which he emerged with some difficulty. We then decided that it was
+impracticable for fishing purposes of the ordinary kind.
+
+Walking home along this bush-covered length we could see the fish
+clearly in its waters, calculate their weight, and wonder how their
+natural fortifications could be sapped and overcome. We nicknamed all
+the fish, so constant and regular were they in their places. One, an
+ugly, ill-shapen fish, with a heavy head, was called "Bradlaugh";
+another veteran, solemn and heavy, was dubbed "Gladstone"; a third,
+more dashing and combative, we christened "Randolph Churchill." There
+were about seven that we knew and named, and to the heaviest and
+thickest of all we gave the name of "Lord Salisbury."
+
+It was a constant source of interest to us, in going up and down the
+stream, to note what our named friends were doing and how they were
+faring. Notes were compared when we came in after fishing, and they
+gradually became an integral portion of our life and party. One evening
+I noticed "Randolph Churchill" greatly on the move, darting hither and
+thither in quest of some article of food. Peering through the bushes, I
+made out that he was taking something that was falling from the trees
+and bushes above, but what that something was I could not precisely
+make out. A poor bumble bee that had fallen into the stream was buzzing
+about, trying to free himself from his watery toils, and floating
+slowly over "Churchill"; the latter came up to look at the buzzer, and
+then bolted as if he had been shot. Evidently that disturbed even his
+equanimity. I had contemplated dapping with a palmer or Marlow buzz;
+and I sat down to cogitate. I called to mind the incident, referred to
+on page 50, of the bold rises of the trout in Loch Dhu at the swarm
+of bees crossing its surface. Whilst trying to reconcile their action
+with that of "Churchill" I was reclining on the grass, and happened to
+espy a green grasshopper. That might do, thought I, and rising, with
+the captured insect in my fingers, I again approached the water side.
+The bumble bee had most effectually scared "Randolph," so I walked down
+to where "Gladstone" had taken up his abode. Nipping the grasshopper
+with my fingers so as to kill it, I managed to flick it over the bushes
+towards my friend. It happened to light on the water at the proper
+place, and I had the pleasure of watching "Gladstone" sail slowly and
+majestically up to the floating insect, open a huge pink mouth, and
+swallow it. That was quite good enough for me, and after dinner I
+retailed to my friend my evening's experiences.
+
+We were soon busily engaged in hunting up bare hooks and stiff rods.
+Fortunately for us there were some long cane-bottom fishing rods in the
+lodge, which evidently had been used in former times for bait fishing;
+the joints were indifferent, the whippings rotten, but the rods were,
+in the main, sound.
+
+A little waxed thread and varnish soon put them into workable trim, and
+before going to bed we pledged a parting glass that some of our friends
+should gain a new experience on the morrow. And so it fell out. We knew
+that playing fish in such overgrown haunts was out of the question,
+and that if we had the luck to hook them it would be a question of
+pull devil, pull baker. Towards evening we met at our trysting-place.
+Green grasshoppers were numerous, so there was no lack of bait. As I
+anticipated, "Randolph Churchill's" inquisitiveness and audacity caused
+him to become our first victim. The bushes were far too thick to let
+us drop our bait near him in the ordinary manner. Our only chance was
+to roll the line round our rods, poke it through the bushes, unroll it
+carefully, dangle it before his nose, and then, if we had the luck to
+hook him, to give him no law, but to trust to our tackle and to hold on
+like grim death.
+
+The next victim that evening was "Bradlaugh," a bold riser, who fought
+well, and who thoroughly justified his cognomen when on the bank.
+"Disraeli" was for some time our master; he knew a trick or two, and
+was by no means easily beguiled, though often pricked and once lightly
+hooked. Even his caution was at length overcome, and hardly an evening
+passed but that one or more of these, relatively speaking, monsters of
+some 2½ to 5 lb. in weight was landed.
+
+"Lord Salisbury," however, proved to be a very difficult nut to crack,
+and beyond our powers of persuasion. He would solemnly inspect our
+lure, sniff round it, as it were, and then sink slowly down to his
+accustomed place. He seemed to know all about it, so, intent on other
+sport with the gun, we at last let him severely alone, telling the
+river keeper to get him out if he could.
+
+One evening, as we were at dinner, there came a pressing message from
+the keeper to be allowed to see us; so, on ordering him in, a smiling
+rubicund visage appeared at the door, that of our friend the keeper,
+bearing in his hands a dish, on which reposed the vast proportions
+of "Lord Sallusberry," as he termed him, a tardy victim to the wiles
+of patience, combined with the reiterated attractions of a green
+grasshopper.
+
+Possibly this kind of dapping may be deemed to be a poor kind of sport,
+and, speaking from a strictly orthodox point of view, the accusation
+cannot be denied. But, after all, it has its merits. It enables you,
+in waters where there are no May flies, to seduce the heavy fish into
+unwonted activity, and into taking surface flies. Thus you remove what
+are little short of pests in a trout stream, and you gain an interest
+in overcoming the difficulties of an otherwise impossible situation.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+GRAYLING FISHING.
+
+
+GRAYLING have one advantage over trout in that they extend your fishing
+season by at least three months. Whereas trout may be called spring
+and summer fish, grayling are autumn and winter fish. While trout
+love positions under overhanging banks, or in the side runs by the
+bank side, grayling, on the other hand, generally occupy positions in
+mid-stream, lying near, or on, the bottom. In rivers that contain both
+fish, a bank rise may be generally put down to a trout. I would have
+substituted the word "confidently" for "generally," had not a very
+competent critic placed a marginal note to my MS., stating that "he
+would it were so."
+
+I can well recall a day on lower Testwater when, in October, on a
+wild, squally day, with gusty rain, I was endeavouring to beguile some
+imprudent grayling into taking my fly. The river keeper accompanied
+me, and together we descried a nice dimpling rise against the far
+bank, above a plank bridge. I at once put it down as a trout, and was
+for leaving it alone; but my keeper friend would not have it so, and
+on persuasion I proffered the fish the fly that happened to be on my
+line. As luck would have it the fly pitched fairly accurately, and,
+nicely cocked, sailed down the bank side just where the rise had been.
+A confident rise produced an equally confident turn of the wrist; our
+friend was well hooked, and a merry five minutes we had before he
+could be beguiled into the landing net. He proved to be a fine trout,
+over 3 lb. in weight and in magnificent condition, but the month was
+against us, and we had to replace him with all due care in his native
+element before resuming our search for the grayling, who were not at
+all inclined to favour us, on that occasion at any rate.
+
+This particular fish certainly endorsed my view, for I felt confident
+in my first opinion, viz., that it was the rise of a trout, and not
+that of a grayling. The keeper, however, was equally confident until he
+was proved wrong, and, as his experiences were a hundredfold greater
+than mine, I would certainly not attempt to advance my own as against
+his. It is so terribly easy to generalise from inadequate experience.
+
+One thing I certainly have learned with regard to grayling fishing
+with a hackle fly, fished wet and up stream, and that is, how easily
+one may miss them through want of rapidity in the strike. I remember a
+friend of mine dancing with laughter on the river bank as he watched me
+miss rise after rise under such circumstances. I seemed to be always a
+little after the fair. It was blind kind of work, casting at the rises,
+the fish having to come up from the bottom to the fly, and somehow
+or other they seemed always to take the wrong psychological moment
+for their rise as far as I was concerned. Occasionally, of course, I
+hooked what I fancied to be a silly idiot of a fish, and it was not
+until my friend had a turn at them and then declared they were rising
+disgracefully short that I was able to turn the laugh against him. When
+I was angling it was always the fault of the angler that the fish were
+not hooked; when his turn came it was entirely the fault of the fish.
+At the same time it is undeniable that to secure grayling, especially
+heavy ones, by this manner of angling requires great alertness, and, as
+it were, sympathy of touch in hooking them.
+
+I cannot pretend to any considerable experiences in grayling fishing,
+but I do not agree with Mr. G. A. B. Dewar, who, in his "Book of
+the Dry Fly," p. 54 (Lawrence & Bullen, 1897), states confidently
+that angling for the grayling with the dry fly is "poor fun." On the
+contrary, I have found him a bold riser, and a really free fighter
+in his own style. He will take a dry fly in hot, bright weather,
+though his real value comes in on frosty days, after the trout have
+earned their well-deserved rest from the plague of artificial flies. A
+grayling, moreover, is in his element in deep pools and quiet hollows,
+where one would hardly expect to see the dimple of a rising trout. At
+the same time the fish loves rapid streams and shallows, retiring for
+rest to the deeper pools.
+
+To be absolutely candid, I would always prefer to fish for trout
+rather than to fish for grayling. This may possibly be through lack
+of experience and opportunity; but no one can gainsay the fact that
+grayling are in condition when trout are not, that they are a worthy
+quarry and gamesome, despite (Brother) Cotton's condemnation of them as
+"dead-hearted" fish. To be able to defer putting away one's favourite
+rods until October, November, and even December have passed away is
+no mean advantage, and I, for one, would be indeed sorry to decry the
+grayling in any way whatever.
+
+Grayling do not, as a rule, rise as freely as trout will do during
+heavy rain, nor does muggy weather suit them; the best time for
+grayling fishing in late autumn or early winter is from about twelve
+to two, on a bright day, after a sharp and crisp frost. As they lie so
+low in the water and have to come to the surface to take a fly, they
+frequently miss their object, whether real or artificial; and after
+they have taken the fly, or missed it, as the case may be, they dive
+downwards to the bottom again, often breaking the water with their
+forked tails in so doing. They are, therefore, more easy of approach
+than trout, as there is a larger intervening amount of water to screen
+you. As they take surface food, and yet lie so deep, their quaint
+lozenge-shaped eyes have an upward turn. They are peculiarly gut shy,
+and any undue coarseness in this respect or glistening glare in your
+cast will effectually choke them off from their intended rise. They may
+be taken by almost any of the ordinary surface flies, by a red tag, or
+by means of many of the pale watery hackle flies fished wet. The depth
+of the water in which they love to lie renders them less susceptible to
+continued flogging than trout. Remember, if you hook a good grayling,
+that the corners of his mouth are very tender compared with those of a
+trout, and that, salmon-like, he takes a header downwards after taking
+your fly, thus tending to hook himself; therefore the quickest and
+gentlest of wrist turns is sufficient to cement the attachment between
+you. And although grayling fishermen will not admit that the mouth of a
+grayling is more tender, generally speaking, than that of a trout, it
+is extraordinary how often the fly happens to attach itself to those
+particularly tender spots. In playing him, this fact should not be
+forgotten, nor the fact that the appearance of the landing net seems to
+produce in him the wildest and most frantic efforts for freedom.
+
+Grayling receive universal condemnation for poaching trout and salmon
+ova, and it is only right to own that they are grave delinquents in
+this respect. The unfortunate ova have, however, a multitude of enemies
+in the shape of various water birds, ducks, swans, &c., and the toll
+taken by the grayling in proportion cannot be so very heavy after
+all, or they would not be permitted to continue to populate our south
+country streams, where the trout is the chief object of worship. At any
+rate, they have no other cannibal proclivities, which is more than can
+be said for the noble trout himself, who is a marked sinner in both
+respects.
+
+Grayling will not thrive in all streams; they love alternate shallows
+and deeps, and are particularly partial to quiet backwaters. They
+are very migratory, and will frequently shift their quarters. The
+character of the river appears to be all-important in their case, and
+many streams suitable for trout will not hold grayling. But where the
+surrounding circumstances are suitable, and the temperature of the
+water is neither too cold nor too hot, it seems a pity that they should
+not be given a trial. They spawn in April, and recover their condition
+more rapidly than trout. I do not know whether the origin of these
+fish in British waters has ever been ascertained. They may have been
+brought to these islands by the monks in former time, who so carefully
+husbanded all resources in the shape of fish food; but I have never
+seen or read any authentic statement to this effect, and would prefer
+to consider them as indigenous.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration: LUNCHEON.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+NOTES ON RAINBOW TROUT.
+
+
+RAINBOWS are a comparatively recent importation into our native
+waters, and appeared just at the time when they were most needed. It
+is but a few years since our British waters, neglected, except in a
+few instances, began to receive the attention they deserved, in view
+of their intrinsic value. Steps were then taken to diminish, if not
+entirely to remove, the terribly universal pollution of our streams
+and rivers. From that time trout fishing prospects in river and stream
+began to look up and improve; but our ponds and reservoirs, if stocked
+with fish at all, contained only the coarse fish of former times. By
+a happy coincidence the rainbow trout, which we owe to our cousins of
+the United States, began to be talked about and known. Speedily our
+fish-culturists took them up and established them in their hatcheries,
+with the best results. A more sporting or gamer fish does not exist. He
+rises most freely to the fly--up to a certain weight--and, when hooked,
+plays as gamely as any sea trout. He grows with astonishing rapidity.
+In our local waters, two-year-old fish, 8 in. long in February, have
+grown to ¾ lb. fish and even to pounders in September. There is
+therefore no excuse for leaving our ponds untenanted by these gamesome
+fish. Moreover, their edible qualities are quite first-rate; they are
+shapely, beautiful in colouring, and thrive in any kind of water. One
+point, however, should be carefully guarded against. Rainbows are great
+travellers; they will push up, especially before spawning, and it is
+therefore necessary to confine them by a grid at the head and foot of
+your water.
+
+The spawning time for these fish in their natural habitat is rather
+late in the spring; but, as might be expected from analogy, rainbows
+bred and reared in this country appear to be adapting themselves to
+their environment, and to be gradually assimilating their time for
+spawning to that of our local trout. The bulk of rainbows spawn in
+British waters about February and March, many retain their old times
+of May and June, whilst a proportion have adapted themselves to their
+surroundings and spawn as early as brook trout. I think that the date
+is more or less influenced by the amount of fish food obtainable. Thus,
+for instance, with hand-fed fish the old later dates are maintained;
+but it is still doubtful, as far as my experience goes, as to whether
+the ova of the fish that are dependent entirely upon natural food
+is ever vivified. My fish undoubtedly have spawned on the prepared
+beds, but, so far, I have not been able to establish any evidence
+of matured fry. The edges of the water this summer were filled with
+multitudinous small fry no doubt, but on careful inspection they proved
+to be entirely the fry of sticklebacks, perch, &c. I have found hen
+fish gravid with ova as early as November and as late as April. In
+time, no doubt, their spawning season will coincide with that of our
+brown trout. And herein lies a field for investigation and careful
+watching. It is held in many quarters that rainbows do not breed in
+Great Britain. My experience hardly tallies with this belief. On our
+waters in Lancashire, where we had no gravel beds suitable for the
+deposit of ova, I found late last year several hen fish, of from 1½ lb.
+to 2 lb. in weight, dead in the water; they were full of ripe ova, and
+had undoubtedly died through being egg-bound. I then made some spawning
+redds suitable for the deposit and fertilisation of the ova, and it
+has been highly interesting to see the fish elbowing each other to
+secure a spot for themselves. Since then I have caught many spent fish,
+both cock and hen, showing that the ova, at any rate, have been duly
+deposited; but so far I have not been able to identify the fry. A large
+quantity of fry of sorts I have secured this season, but they proved to
+be the fry of stickleback. The "Trinity" two-year-old fish I restocked
+with seem to be growing admirably. This form of rainbow trout have
+the reputation of being, if possible, freer risers, quicker growers,
+and harder fighters than the ordinary kind; so far they seem to act up
+to their reputation. The few I have caught fought like little demons,
+and it was almost difficult to be able to restore them to the water
+and free the hook before they had been practically exhausted by their
+frantic efforts for freedom.
+
+The proper amount of fish with which to stock a given area of water
+depends several circumstances. First and foremost, of course, it
+depends upon the amount of fish food in it. Many pools and ponds are
+full of fresh-water shrimps, snails, and the like, all of which are
+of very great value in developing and fattening your fish. But as you
+do not want to depend upon bottom feeding for their whole stock of
+food, admirable adjunct though it may be, it is well to place round
+the margins of your waters all plants that encourage the increase
+of fly food. Beds of the ordinary watercress are not only valuable
+in this respect, but afford welcome shelter. Water lilies, if kept
+within bounds, are equally valuable, and it must never be forgotten
+that, especially in shallow water, shelter from the summer sun is an
+absolute necessity if you wish your stock to improve. Other aquatic
+and semi-aquatic plants should also be utilised freely, such as marsh
+marigolds, starworts, bulrushes, &c. Nor should it be forgotten
+to plant alders and fringing willows here and there. All trout,
+particularly rainbows, take an alder fly readily.
+
+A certain area of water will not support more than a certain weight
+of fish life. You can therefore either have that weight made up by a
+large quantity of small fish or by a correspondingly smaller number of
+larger fish. It is not prudent, therefore, to overstock. This question
+has necessarily very considerable bearing upon your calculations. Nor
+is it possible to fix arbitrarily any precise number of fish as being
+capable of being supported by a given area of water; an examination of
+the water itself would be needed to determine this with any degree of
+accuracy.
+
+Having, however, once determined upon the proper stock required--and,
+in my opinion, it pays better to stock with two-year-old fish than
+with yearlings--then an accurate account should be kept of the fish
+taken out of the water each season, and a corresponding number should
+be turned in each November for restocking, a few being added for
+contingencies.
+
+As I have already stated, when rainbows grow into really big fish--say
+over 2½ lb.--they appear, in our British waters, to develop lazy,
+bottom-feeding proclivities. It will be necessary, therefore, or at
+any rate advisable, to take these fish out by using a bright salmon
+fly, fished deep, or a minnow, fished as deep as the water will admit.
+When the fish are first placed in their fresh home it is customary
+to feed them with artificial food until they get accustomed to their
+surroundings. For this purpose liver is often used, and it is quite an
+amusing sight to see them "boil" when such food is distributed. It is
+very doubtful whether it is wise to feed with such fat-producing foods.
+Some authorities hold that fatty foods of any kind produce disease of
+the liver and fatty degeneration, and condemn absolutely all red meat.
+If this be so--and it appears to be not only probable, but proved by
+expert experience--it is better to let the fish take care of themselves
+and eschew all kinds of artificial food stuffs.
+
+When stocking, every care should be taken to see that when the fish
+arrive they are placed as soon as possible where the water is most
+lively and broken, so that they may, at the earliest practicable
+moment, obtain the air they so much need after their journey. The water
+in the cans should never be allowed to stagnate. One more precaution
+is indispensable, viz., to see, by means of a thermometer, that the
+temperature of the water in the stream or pond is the same as that in
+the cans. If there should be any difference--and there will almost
+certainly be--it can easily be adjusted by letting some water out of
+the cans and substituting that of the stream. By doing this gradually
+the fish will become acclimatised to the change. The cans on the cart,
+meanwhile, should be agitated, and therefore aerated, by keeping the
+cart on the move. Neglect of this will cause serious risk of loss.
+Once safely deposited in their new home, the fish will speedily spread
+over your whole water, even if all were put in at one spot. Perhaps
+it is unnecessary to add that fish should never be handled when being
+put into the water. A small flat net will pick up any that may have
+fallen on the ground during the change of water. It is surprising
+how thoughtless many people are about handling and treating fish.
+Thus, for instance, if an undersized fish is caught it is, in common
+parlance, "thrown back," and is often in reality so treated. Too much
+care cannot be taken in replacing fish. If put back gently and held for
+a few seconds in a proper position, back up, they will soon recover
+from their exhaustion and glide away unharmed; whereas, if "thrown
+in," or dropped in in a careless manner, they will turn belly up, and
+probably never recover.
+
+When all precautions are taken, and your waters have been intelligently
+treated, and suitable spawning redds are provided, you will never
+regret having stocked with rainbows, for the sport you will obtain from
+them will more than amply repay you for the trouble you may have taken.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+SALMON FISHING.
+
+
+FORMERLY, and indeed not so very long ago, no one in the Highlands of
+Scotland was considered free of the hill, or indeed of any account,
+unless and until he had slain a stag, a salmon, and an eagle. Nowadays,
+matters are somewhat different. The two former, inhabiting as they do
+the forests and rivers, are in great request, and have a considerable
+money value, and, in consequence, have passed into the hands of those
+who have the deepest purses, saving and except where some few Highland
+lairds and noblemen retain their ancient rights in their own hands, and
+dispense their hospitality amongst their friends as of yore. As for
+the golden eagle, few would attempt, or even wish, to shoot so noble a
+bird. The ordinary forest fine of £500 is a sufficient deterrent, if,
+indeed, any is necessary. Every effort is now being made, and should be
+made, to keep the (now, alas! scarce) king of the birds amongst us.
+
+But if, as we have said, the large majority of the forests and
+salmon rivers are rented by those who are able and willing to pay
+almost any price for the dignity of being lessees of such tempting
+and highly-prized sporting grounds, the general appetite and desire
+have developed and grown enormously. Ever-increasing facilities for
+travelling have brought with them an ever-growing army of men, all
+eager to get good salmon fishing, and searching high and low to secure
+it. Norway, Sweden, Iceland, Canada, British Columbia, and a host of
+other portions of the globe have been brought into requisition in
+order to satisfy some portion of this craving. Small wonder, then, that
+rents for rivers, spring or autumn, continue to increase, and that
+the Government of the day is being constantly and consistently urged
+to increase the close time for net fishing, in order that the upper
+riparian owners may have some chance of replenishing their pools.
+
+A man who has once hooked and played a clean-run salmon, and has
+experienced the thrill of excitement that continues from the rise until
+the salmon is safely landed, is not at all likely to forget it, or to
+miss any chance of renewing his acquaintance with _Salmo salar_.
+
+The contest is such a fair one, there are so many chances in favour
+of the fish, that no element of sport is wanting. He is so strong
+in the water, so perfectly built for speed, that unless you handle
+him both carefully and skilfully you may easily lose him, even if
+you have brought him exhausted to the gaff. In that perilous moment,
+when flopping and surging near the top of the water, how many a fish
+effects his escape! And who is there amongst us but has experienced the
+sickening feeling of the straightened rod, and the fly released from
+the worn hold in the fish's mouth? It is just the uncertainty of the
+sport, added to the strength and vigour of a hooked fish, that form the
+great allurement to salmon anglers.
+
+Whilst in trout fishing--more especially with the dry fly--great
+accuracy and delicacy of cast are required, the actual fishing for
+salmon with the fly makes no such demands upon the angler. Provided
+that he can throw a tolerably straight line of reasonable length,
+so as to cover the places in the pools where the salmon are wont to
+rise, many faults that would entail failure with the dry fly will pass
+unnoticed, owing to the fly having been cast into swiftly running
+water, which brawling water straightens out in the kindest manner the
+kinks formed in the line by the incompetency of the wielder of the rod.
+
+To this extent, therefore, a novice may have the good fortune to beat
+the more experienced hand. Once hooked, however, the novice is out
+of it, unless he has at hand an experienced mentor, and the odds are
+largely in favour of the fish. It is then that the accomplished angler
+asserts himself. I have heard of men who consider that the excitement
+of salmon fishing begins and ends with the hooking of the fish, who
+are willing to hand over to their attendant, or gillie, the duty which
+they consider to be monotonous and fatiguing--of playing the fish.
+
+For my part, I look at the matter from an entirely different point of
+view. The combat between the fisherman and the fish is essentially a
+gallant one. In the water, a clean-run fish of, say, 18 lb. really
+plays the angler for some space of time, and you recognise that
+although your experience and intelligence may enable you, within a
+reasonable time, to be the victor, yet that you have attached to you a
+quarry well worthy of your skill, and one, moreover, who may yet call
+forth all your activity and resource, and who cannot be accounted as
+caught until he is absolutely on the grass beside you.
+
+I, on the contrary, always consider that playing a salmon is the most
+exciting and interesting part of the sport. In playing a fish, whether
+it be a heavy trout on a light, single-handed rod, or a clean-run
+active salmon on a proportionately suitable rod, a sense of touch is
+needed that bears some resemblance to that necessary for the proper
+handling of the reins in riding a keen young thoroughbred horse. You
+require a keen appreciation of when to allow a certain latitude and
+when to exercise all the pressure that the occasion demands.
+
+A heavy-handed man will soon render a sensitive-mouthed young horse
+half demented, whilst at the same time quiet, strong hands exert just
+that influence that is needed to control his vagaries. Some men are
+born with the requisite sensitiveness of touch, others will be clumsy
+and heavy-handed to the end of their days. Some will give undue licence
+to a fish, will allow him to play for an inordinate length of time,
+triplicating thereby the risk of losing him.
+
+It is not possible to lay down on paper any regulations for playing
+fish beyond what may be termed the "A B C" of the game. You should
+never allow your rod point to be dragged down below an angle of 45°
+with the vertical, or a smash of your casting line will be risked. On
+the other hand, if the rod be kept too vertical an unfair tax is placed
+upon the strength of your middle joint. Another cardinal point, as
+every angler knows, is that you should never allow more line off your
+reel than you can avoid; that is to say, if your fish means running
+either up or down stream, and you feel instinctively that it would be
+neither prudent nor practicable to hold him too hard, then you must try
+to keep on terms with him by means of your own movements on the bank
+side; for it is to be presumed that, although you may have hooked your
+fish when wading in mid-stream, you have taken the earliest opportunity
+of wading ashore.
+
+Keep nearly level with him, or down stream of him if you can, and get
+the weight of the water acting against him as well as the weight of
+the line. Never try to force a fish up a heavy stream unless such a
+course is absolutely necessary, for the weight of the water, added
+to that of the fish, may unduly strain your tackle. That you may be
+compelled to try to prevent his going down stream at times goes without
+saying, for it may be absolutely necessary to do so; but to endeavour
+to force a fresh and strong fish up stream against his will is to court
+disaster. Should you have decided that your fish, if it is to be killed
+at all, must be kept in the pool in which he then is at all hazards,
+by judiciously giving him his head, by means of taking off the strain,
+may frequently induce him to abandon his attempt to force his way
+down stream, and, under the impression that he has already gained his
+freedom, he may often, of his own free will, head up stream once again.
+It is a risky, but often the only, course to adopt, if you cannot or
+will not follow a fish down.
+
+Mr. Sidney Buxton, in that most charming of books, "Fishing and
+Shooting" (John Murray, 1902), sums up the whole matter admirably when
+he describes catching and playing salmon as "living moments."
+
+I have seen stalwart soldiers, and I have one V.C. particularly
+before my eyes at the moment of writing, covered with perspiration
+and quivering in every limb after a long and successful duel with
+a clean-run fish. In this respect salmon fishing is ahead of trout
+fishing, for the contest is a more even one; though in my opinion the
+two, being distinct and incomparable, ought never to be put into the
+scales and weighed the one against the other.
+
+Watch an old hand at the game, and observe how easily he controls the
+most determined and vigorous rushes of his worthy antagonist; take out
+your watch and see how long it will be before the 18 or 20 pounder is
+brought alongside for the gaff; and then watch the poor performer,
+hesitating and uncertain as to when pressure should be applied or
+licence given; see how long it takes him to land the 8 lb. or 10 lb.
+fish; count the number of times that he has to thank a beneficent
+providence that he has not lost him; and if, after so doing, you still
+incline to your statement that there is nothing in landing a fish, that
+the whole pleasurable excitement is concentrated in hooking him, then
+I can only reply that I don't agree. The contest between the hooked
+salmon and the fisherman is no uneven one--witness the number of hooked
+fish that escape--and it is one that is still capable of giving a
+thrill of real excitement to those who really love angling.
+
+A salmon hooked from a boat in a large loch is, of course, a different
+matter; here the odds are so largely in favour of the rod holder as to
+unduly diminish the chances of escape to the fish. Such salmon fishing
+is outside the scope of our present argument, and falls into a totally
+different category. With river-bank fishing, and it is with that that
+we are dealing, it would be a bold fisherman indeed that would count a
+fish hooked as a fish landed, and a half-hearted angler that would be
+content to hand over to the gillie the cream of the contest between the
+fish and the man.
+
+_Apropos_ of this nervous excitement, in October, 1900, I formed one
+of a shooting party on Don side. The river Don ran within half a mile
+from the house, forming as perfect a series of natural pools as the
+heart of man could desire. My mouth watered when I saw it, and I longed
+to wet a line in it. I found, however, that my host not only loathed
+fishing, but was absolutely devoted to bridge. We had but short days
+out shooting, everyone rushing back to the lodge to get a rubber or
+two before dinner. Professing ignorance of bridge, I begged my host
+to let me try the river, as, having been lately fishing on the Dee, I
+had my rods and waders with me. With a pitying smile he told me that I
+could, of course, amuse myself as I thought best. With no loss of time
+I made my way down to the river side, and found it in grand ply. I was
+fully aware that the particular part of the Don that we were on was not
+popularly supposed to contain many fish at that time of the year, but
+it was well worth a trial, and I knew that a ship laden with lime had
+lately been sunk at the mouth of the Dee, and I fancied and hoped that
+some of the autumn fish might be finding their way into and up the Don.
+The pools were so perfect in shape that no gillie was needed to point
+me out the best rising-places; they spoke for themselves and told their
+own tale.
+
+My first evening produced two clean-run fish of 16½ lb. and 8 lb., and
+my host, when he saw them later, began to think that, after all, there
+might be something in angling. The second evening the river was up and
+unfishable, but by the third evening it had fined down into order,
+and I got a beauty of 20 lb. and a small salmon of 7½ lb. The glowing
+accounts I gave of the play of these fish at length excited my host,
+and, even at the cost of his rubber of bridge, the next evening saw
+him by my side, carefully fishing a leg of mutton pool near the house,
+where I had seen and risen a fish the night before. I had to hold the
+rod with him and show him how to cast, but I knew pretty well where
+my fish lay, and that he was within easy reach. We worked down to the
+spot, and, sure enough, up he came with a grand head and tail rise,
+hooking himself handsomely. Leaving the rod in my friend's hands, I
+told him that he had to do the rest. The first rush nearly pulled the
+rod down to the water level, my friend hanging on like grim death.
+Fortunately, the gut was sound and stood the strain. Nearly dying with
+laughter at his frantic appeals for help and advice, I shouted to him
+to keep his rod point up, thoroughly enjoying the fact that he was
+having a taste of what he had characterised as a "poor and tame kind of
+sport."
+
+As I particularly wanted him to catch that fish I went to his
+assistance. Trembling with excitement and bathed in perspiration, he
+was, shortly afterwards, delightedly examining his first salmon, a
+clean-run hen fish of 16 lb. I never shall forget his shake of the hand
+and his exclamation, "By Jupiter! you have taught me something, this
+is worth living for!" Needless to say, he is now mad keen on salmon
+angling, and a very capable performer to boot.
+
+Many of us, however, not quite so young as we were, are paying the
+penalty of imprudent wading in the times when we scorned to put on
+wading trousers. The rheumatic twinges, that hesitation about deep
+wading in rivers with bad bottoms, all these are largely bred of our
+former contempt for getting wet, and our ill-founded confidence in our
+powers of resisting the effects of such very minor matters as wet legs
+and feet. We therefore find our choice of fishing water still more
+limited: we seek fishings where many of the pools can be commanded from
+the bank side, or where, if wading be unavoidable, the bottom is sound
+and shelving, and where there are no round slippery stones to trip us
+up. Enough for most of us, if we are lucky enough to get into touch
+with a good fish, is it that we may have a longish travel over very
+rough ground, up and down, before we can call him ours.
+
+[Illustration: NEARING THE END.]
+
+One particularly bad-bottomed pool I remember very well in the
+Aberdeenshire Dee, not very far below Aboyne. It was a long pool, the
+head of water very heavy, the wading throughout simply vile. At the
+bottom of the pool was a big rock, nearly in mid-stream, and by that
+stone there generally lay a good fish. To reach him you had to wade
+as deep as your waders would permit, your elbows almost in the water,
+leaning your body against the swirl of the stream, and taking cautious
+steps forward, inch by inch, to avoid being tripped up by the slippery
+big round stones. Then the best cast you were able to produce with your
+18 ft. Castleconnel would just about reach him. I never could resist
+trying for him, though I knew he would go down stream if hooked, and it
+seemed impossible to follow him down, so I always half wished that he
+might not come. Wading back against that heavy stream, with a twenty or
+thirty pounder making tracks round the corner into the next pool, would
+have been no easy job; and, if you had succeeded in reaching terra
+firma, there were some big overhanging trees at the corner, beneath
+which the current had cut a deep hole. Mercifully for me, though I
+often tried for him, he never did take hold, though I rose him several
+times. It was always with a chastened spirit of thankfulness that I
+gave him up and went further down to try the easier waters of the Boat
+pool.
+
+There is a local story of a mighty fish, hooked in that self-same spot,
+which took its captor down so that he was obliged, perforce, to swim
+the deep water under the trees, and was afterwards taken down, as hard
+as he could run, through pool after pool, until at length he managed
+to steady it in the third pool of the next fishing water. Then, after
+a period of sulks, during which both regained their wind, the fish ran
+right away up again to his old haunts, where he succeeded in getting
+rid of the hook against his favourite rock. All lost fish are big,
+and the lapse of time has not in any way diminished his fabled weight.
+
+Perhaps the one drawback to salmon fishing as an art is that to which
+I have already alluded, viz., that the friendly stream corrects of
+itself all, or nearly all, errors of slovenly casting, and in that
+respect places the duffer more on a par with the really competent. On
+the other hand, knowledge and experience, and perhaps more particularly
+local experience, will assert itself in the long run, even against the
+adventitious success of the novice.
+
+The mere fact of having really fished a pool, whether success reward
+your efforts or no, is of itself an element of enjoyment; the feeling
+that you have fished, and fished with a really working fly every inch
+of fishable water, is _per se_ a cause of satisfaction and pleasure.
+Here you are master of the situation; on you depends your chance of
+sport, if any is to be obtained.
+
+In grouse driving you may draw the worst butt; or, if you have the luck
+to draw the best, the birds may unaccountably take an unusual line,
+and, though you may have drawn the "King's butt," nearly every bird may
+pass over the heads of your comrades to the right and left of you. You
+are, as it were, a mere automaton, to shoot whatever may come within
+range; you may be the victim of circumstances, and may get very few
+chances.
+
+In hunting, unless you hunt the hounds yourself, you have little chance
+of seeing, and none whatever of controlling, the best part of the game,
+the working of the hounds. Your main object is to be with them; they
+and the huntsman, or master, do the work, you are merely an accessory.
+
+In fishing, whether it be for trout or salmon, everything from start to
+finish rests with yourself; you have to work out your own salvation;
+and I venture to assert that it is in consequence of this individual
+responsibility that fishing, apart from its other many merits, holds so
+high a place in all our affections.
+
+I doubt whether there are many men who have not become aware, in
+playing salmon (and perhaps more often when the fish is nearly played
+out), of a second fish following the hooked one in all its movements
+and stratagems to free itself from the unwelcome attachment of the rod
+and line. It has several times happened to me personally, and on two
+occasions that I can call to mind I was within an ace of being able to
+gaff the free fish when bringing the exhausted and hooked fish past
+me for the gaffing process. I feel confident that, had I not been too
+much engaged in seeing that my hooked fish did not get free through
+any unintentional slackening of my line at that most critical moment,
+I could have done so successfully, so assiduous was the (apparently)
+hen fish in attendance upon the fish at the end of my line. Is this a
+mere matter of curiosity on his or her part, or may it be attributed
+to a feeling of _camaraderie_ or friendship? I think no one can
+seriously contend for the latter hypothesis, as instances of affection
+between such cold-blooded animals as fish have never to my knowledge
+been even suggested. We must therefore, I take it, assume that it
+is mere curiosity, a desire to see why the hooked fish is acting so
+capriciously; and, if this be so, has it not a tendency to modify
+somewhat our views as to the necessity of resting pools after a fish
+has disturbed them by his being played? The following fish will, of
+course, have been taken out of the place where it would probably rise
+at a fly, and, therefore, out of any danger for the time being; but
+travelling fish are not infrequently hooked and landed.
+
+My observations of salmon, such as they have been, have rather tended
+to inspire me with the belief that salmon, when resting in a pool,
+take little or no notice of what is going on round them. They will
+move just so far aside as to let a rampant fish pass them, gliding
+back into their former position the moment he has passed. How often,
+when fish are really "on the job," have fishermen caught their four,
+five, or even more fish out of one pool of very moderate dimensions,
+every square yard of which must have been disturbed by the vagaries of
+those caught before them? It seems to me that we are all inclined to be
+a bit too cautious and careful in this respect. When the water is in
+order, then I should be inclined to say, seize the happy moment, often
+short-lived enough, and don't waste time in going to other pools as
+long as you have any reason to suppose that the fish are "up," and that
+there are other occupants of the pool that you are fishing that may be
+grassed.
+
+Somehow or other, if a fish be lightly hooked the information is
+conveyed through the line, as through a telephone, to the wielder of
+the rod. You obtain a kind of realisation that such is the case, no
+matter how well you have endeavoured to drive the barb home. And his
+subsequent play shows you how well-founded your feeling was. You are
+in constant expectation of seeing your rod point come up--unwelcome
+sight--and if you have the luck to get the gaff home, and the hook
+drops out of his mouth, you are not one whit astonished, only thankful
+that your luck for once was in the ascendant, and that you have not one
+more to add to the very considerable number of fish hooked and lost.
+
+In the same way with a fish that "jiggers," I, rightly or wrongly,
+always set him down as being lightly hooked, and invariably offer up a
+thanksgiving if he be safely brought to bank. Can anyone tell us why a
+fish so acts? It is undoubtedly most disconcerting to the angler, and
+must assuredly have a tendency to wear the hold of the hook. But if it
+is so effectual, why do not more fish adopt it? Is it not permissible
+to think that my hypothesis is right, and that a lightly-hooked fish
+is able to appreciate that if he can only enlarge the hold of the
+fly he may get free? Or, if this is too much to attribute to fish
+intelligence, what other suggestion can be made? Of course, all my
+argument is upset if my premise is unsound, that it is lightly-hooked
+fish that employ the manoeuvre of "jiggering" to free themselves.
+
+The question is, of course, difficult of solution; at the same time, I
+have invariably found that it is just those fish that I have already
+set down in my mind as being lightly hooked that have resorted to that
+expedient.
+
+I have always found it very advantageous to keep a good yard of free
+casting line in my left hand, letting this slack go at the end of the
+cast. This is exceedingly useful in getting out a long line; indeed,
+it has become such a part of my nature that I invariably do the same
+in dry-fly fishing for trout. In that case I find it helps me to pitch
+my fly more lightly, and to correct my length; it has one drawback in
+trout fishing, in that it prevents you from striking from the reel, but
+it does not inconvenience me, for I merely turn the wrist in striking
+a trout, so that the fact of my fingers gripping the line against
+the rod does not matter. It may not be quite orthodox, but I find it
+convenient, and always practise it; in fact, it is so much a matter of
+second nature with me that I could not give it up, even if I wished
+to do so. It is of great advantage, in fishing any pool, to have seen
+the river in all its various stages, so as to know as much as possible
+of its bed. As everyone knows, the places where fish rise vary as the
+river may be high or low; one place where, in high water, you might
+reckon on getting a rise if anywhere, would be absolutely unlikely when
+the river is low; and so also in the intermediate stages. Until you
+have become fully acquainted with the bed of the various pools, you are
+not in a position to make the best of them; that is why a gillie with
+local knowledge is so necessary. Perhaps you have fished a pool when
+it was in perfect order. The next time you try it the river has sunk a
+foot; it may still be fishable, but if you get a rise it will be almost
+certainly in a different spot from the time before.
+
+On the Awe, in Argyleshire, a few years ago, after a summer drought
+the river had dwindled down to about half its normal volume. A rod had
+been fishing very sedulously a favourite pool of mine called Arroch. I
+watched him for some time, and at last suggested that I did not think
+he was at all likely to get a fish in the tail of the pool, where he
+was employing most of his energies. He replied that he had caught many
+a fish in that very part. I told him that it was doubtless true when
+the river was in proper order, but that it was most unlikely in its
+then condition. Somewhat nettled, he asked me to show him where I would
+propose to fish; and, having my rod with me, I commenced to fish at the
+very top of the pool, in a narrow, deep neck. At about my fourth or
+fifth cast with a very short line, I noticed below me the silvery glint
+of a fish that my fly had evidently moved. Stepping back a little, I
+began, with great deliberation, to fill and light a pipe, and then
+began again where I had originally commenced. At my fourth cast I saw
+the same glint, and also felt the fish, which had taken the fly when
+it was well sunk and was swirling about in the quick and heavy stream.
+It was, of course, a great piece of luck, yet it served to point my
+moral and adorn my tale. My friend was good enough to say that it was a
+revelation to him, that he would no more have thought of fishing that
+neck of the pool than of flying.
+
+It is astonishing how many anglers are similarly constituted. They
+are content to fish a pool in just the same way, no matter what the
+state of the river may be. They never seem to fish from their heads,
+nor to bring any intelligence to bear. In a really big river it is
+possible to pick up an odd fish in the most extraordinary places. Once
+on the Carlogie water of the Dee, the river was in big flood, full of
+snow-brue, and apparently hopeless to fish; but the grilse had begun
+to run, and my time on the water was drawing to a close. Something
+must be done; it seemed foolish to stop at home and waste a day, so I
+walked up to the top of the Long Pool and fished my own bank down with
+a short line. My perseverance was rewarded, and I managed to secure
+three grilse. The great thing is to keep going, and to try to bring all
+your acquired experience to bear. A dry fly will never catch a salmon;
+your fly must be kept in the water, and not on the bank. The assiduous
+fisherman will beat the lazy one into fits.
+
+National interest is, undoubtedly, being more constantly directed to
+the importance of our salmon fisheries. Thus, this very year, 1905, an
+influential deputation, headed by the Duke of Abercorn, was received
+at the Offices of the Board of Agriculture, the object being to obtain
+Governmental support to a private Bill that had been drafted with the
+idea of giving increased powers to the Central Board, and to boards
+of Conservators generally. The Bill, mild and tentative though it was
+in its provisions, met with but qualified support at headquarters, as
+it involved questions of finance, and possible rate aid to boards of
+Conservators in carrying out necessary improvements in cases where
+the local authorities refused to act. The question is, however, too
+vast and too important to be dealt with by piecemeal legislation of
+any kind, and, in regard to the vast national asset that is being
+squandered and frittered away, demands energetic legislation on a bold
+scale.
+
+The salmon fishery industry is a factor in the prosperity of the
+nation, and the whole issue, with all its branches and ramifications,
+should be fairly and squarely tackled in a Government Bill, not in the
+interests of a class, but in that of the nation.
+
+It is satisfactory to learn from Lord Onslow that the Government Bill
+dealing with obstructions and fish passes, though temporarily withdrawn
+last Session, still embodies the views of the present Administration.
+We must be thankful for small mercies, but this Bill merely touches one
+item of importance, and any Government that has the courage and wisdom
+to deal with the question as a whole will certainly have done something
+to merit the lasting gratitude of the whole country.
+
+Since these lines were penned, the Election of January, 1906, has come
+and gone, and with it a vast change in the aspect of political matters.
+The point, however, that we are advocating is not a party question. It
+is a matter affecting the interests of all classes, and it is devoutly
+to be hoped that the new Government will take a "liberal" view of this
+important matter, and will bring forward a bill, in the interests of
+the nation at large, dealing with the whole question of our salmon
+harvest in the rivers as well as the sea.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration: GET THE GAFF READY.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+A TRIP TO IRELAND.
+
+
+SOME years ago, when Ireland was greatly disturbed--it was the year
+after Lord Leitrim's assassination--a party of three, of which I formed
+one, decided to fish the Clady, in Co. Donegal. We went _viâ_ Belfast
+and Letterkenny, bound for Gweedore. We had received many warnings
+against our projected trip, and were told that the "Boys" would not
+allow us to cross the mountains in our outside cars on our long drive
+from Letterkenny. Death's heads and crossbones, however, did not deter
+us, though our car drivers were sufficiently impressed and alarmed
+to insist that, if they took us, we should undertake to keep them at
+Gweedore until we returned. This we had to concede, and off we set.
+
+The reports of the Clady were most temptingly satisfactory. The
+malcontents had burnt the nets at the mouth of the river at Dum-Dum,
+as they were the property of our landlord; the fish had, therefore, a
+clean run up the river. The talented author of "Three in Norway, by One
+of Them," had taken a fabulous number of salmon shortly before--report
+said fifty fish in one fortnight--so it was not likely that three
+sturdy fishermen would be frightened by paper threats. As a proper
+measure of protection we were each of us in possession of a revolver,
+more for show, should occasion arise, than because we were likely to
+need it for our protection. Our drive, if my memory serves me right,
+was over fifty miles in length, and was satisfactorily accomplished
+without any startling incident or need for the display of our lethal
+weapons. We were not sorry when it was over, and we were able to get
+off our cars and see what comforts the hotel could provide.
+
+The local peasantry, of course, were not inimical to us as individuals,
+but were determined to score off our landlord, and to destroy or
+diminish his profits from the fishing. We had, therefore, to house and
+care for our gillies as well, in order to save them from maltreatment.
+Fortunately the river, though on the low side, was in fair order, and
+the pools were crammed full of fish--too full, indeed, for sport; and
+though we did not exactly equal the totals credited to our predecessor,
+still, we could not complain of the results. The fish, bright and
+clean, were not heavy--averaging not more than 10 lb. to 11 lb.--but
+they fought well. Neither were they by any means perfect in shape,
+being long and narrow, altogether less good-looking than their cousins
+of the Crolly, who use the same _embouchure_. These latter are perfect
+in contour and shape, more like Awe or Avon fish.
+
+Sport throughout our fortnight's stay was distinctly good, though
+not remarkable, but the visit gave rise to some, to me, interesting
+experiences. Thus, in one pool, called the Pulpit pool, the usual cast
+is from the top of some very high rocks, as the name implies, into the
+cauldron below. The fish lie near the rocks on the pulpit side; from
+there the fly would never hang or fish properly; do what you would,
+it resembled a bunch of dead feathers. On the other hand, there was
+a convenient run on that side, down which a fish could be taken into
+the pool below; and, as the fish hooked there always would insist on
+going down, this point was one of some importance. On the opposite side
+of the pool there was a charming shelving beach, or bank, and if you
+could find a fly so well tempered as to stand being thrown against the
+rocks opposite to you, you were almost certain of a rise, as your fly
+then played admirably over the taking part of the pool. The problem was
+then how your fish could be played when hooked, for between you and the
+before-mentioned run was a line of serrated rocks, and a fish hooked
+that meant going down would inevitably cut you. He must, therefore, not
+be allowed to go down. Luckily, between you and this line of rocks was
+a deepish backwater, and this was our _deus ex machina_, and solved the
+difficulty. In this backwater we stationed the gillie, gaff in hand,
+and crouched down; no sooner was a fish hooked than, before he could
+realise the situation, he was unceremoniously hurried across the pool
+into the backwater, and there equally unceremoniously gaffed. After two
+or three fish had been so treated our gillie remarked sadly, "Well,
+sorr, you may call this fishing, but I call it murther"; and so it
+really was.
+
+As an example of how a difficulty may be overcome it was not without
+its value. The moral is that a fish, when first hooked and before
+he has realised what is happening, can be readily persuaded to act
+according to your will, as he will never consent to do later on. Just
+as a heavy trout lying amongst a bank of weeds can, if you can get his
+head up, be led holus-bolus over and across the weeds into reasonable
+water directly you have hooked him, so, in a similar manner, a salmon
+will often allow you a latitude in dealing with him at first that
+he won't give you a second time. Frequently the heaviest fish take
+some time after being hooked before they are roused to a sense of
+their position, and exert themselves to the full to get rid of the
+annoying restraint. The strong upward pull of a salmon rod, tending
+to pull him out of his natural element, is what a fish girds against,
+naturally enough, and I have frequently found it of advantage to take
+the strain entirely off a fish that is making too determined an effort
+to leave a pool. Give him his head and he will often stop his run and
+save you from the risk of being cut or broken. There is necessarily a
+considerable element of risk in so doing, but desperate cases often
+require desperate remedies. As with trout, so with salmon, hand lining
+can frequently be resorted to advantageously, and it is wonderful how
+easily salmon can be led by that means out of dangerous places, and
+even brought to the gaff; the strain being removed, they do not seem to
+resist an insidious and horizontal pull.
+
+In the pool below the Pulpit I had my first experience in learning how
+to deal with a clean-run fish, hooked fairly and firmly in the thick
+part of the tail. I had, of course, had to play foul-hooked fish, but I
+had never hooked one in that part before. I was casting a longish line,
+and rose a fish at the tail of the pool. On my offering him the fly a
+second time he made a big splashy rise; I struck, and was in him. Down
+he went into the next pool like a mad thing. The travelling, for me,
+was bad, and the gillie had to steady me by holding on to the band of
+my Norfolk jacket. I held the fish as hard as I dared, but he was bent
+on running, out of one pool into and through the next; race as I would
+over the wet and slippery rocks, I never could get on terms with him,
+and he led me by some forty or fifty yards of line. As he had never
+shown so far and was playing so hard, both my gillie and I thought we
+were into a real big one. We were now nearing the falls above the sea
+pool; I was pretty near pumped out, so some resolute measures had to be
+taken. I accordingly, whilst holding on for all I was worth, sent the
+gillie ahead to stone him up. No sooner was he turned than he was done,
+and the gaff in him, and then only did we find out how he was hooked.
+He weighed no more than 14 lb., and had we known where the hook was,
+and had we not put him down as a real big fish, he would have never
+have been permitted to play such pranks and lead us such a dance. Had
+I held him really hard, his down-stream rush would soon have finished
+him, as the water running through his gills would have choked him.
+
+One day we decided to try the Crolly, wishing to sample some of those
+beautiful fish, and, as it meant a seven-mile walk over the hills,
+we left our salmon rods at home, taking instead only double-handed
+trout rods. On arriving, we found the wind very foul, blowing partly
+across and partly up the river, so that it was no easy matter to
+command the pools at all properly with our small rods. One fish in
+particular annoyed us by showing constantly in a part of the water we
+could barely reach and could not command, so we instituted a kind of
+angling tournament, each of us in turn trying to get over him properly.
+Our gillies were watching intently and open-mouthed. One of them, Pat
+by name, had a peculiarly ugly mouth, with heavy, protruding lips;
+and whilst he was watching thus intently, the unkind wind brought my
+friend's fly, a big Jock Scott, right into his mouth, fixed it firmly
+into his lower lip, the forward cast sending it well home, and nearly
+dragging poor Pat into the river. We none of us felt equal to attacking
+the fly in its weird position, so we sent Pat down to the village,
+a mile or more away, to get the local doctor to extract it. Down he
+went, only to return an hour later with the fly still sticking in its
+former position, and having received a severe drubbing with shillelahs
+from the locals for having presumed to gillie for us. Pretty well black
+and blue all over, his lower lip enormously swollen, he looked indeed
+a sorry sight. Something had now to be done, so it then occurred to
+one of us to strip the fly, which fortunately was not an eyed one, and
+take it out the reverse way. This was done accordingly without delay, a
+plug of tobacco was stuffed into the gaping hole, a good jorum of "the
+craytur" was speedily administered, and Pat soon forgot all about his
+thrashing and his sore lip in his keenness to gaff the fish we managed
+to catch.
+
+Owing to our being so severely boycotted, we had to manage for food
+at the hotel as best we could, and the monotonous diet of salmon in
+every form or shape, varied with a ham or piece of bacon, disagreed
+thoroughly with me, and somewhat marred the perfect enjoyment of my
+trip.
+
+On Sundays we used to drive to the Protestant church in a big brake,
+so as to take the servants with us and protect them from possible
+violence; and one sermon we heard there amused us mightily. We were
+sitting in the big square pew just under the pulpit. The parson
+preached us an impassioned sermon on intolerance, and I must candidly
+admit that I have seldom listened to a more intolerant one. He
+launched forth into a tirade of abuse of most things, of absenteeism
+in particular, bewailing the sorrows of his poor, distressful country,
+and attributing the large majority of her troubles to a non-resident
+gentry. "They come here," said he, "not to do their duty or to help us,
+but merely to gratify their miserable sporting instincts" (and here we
+began to feel very small); "but," he added, leaning over the side of
+the pulpit in our direction, "not, gintlemen, that I allude to angling,
+for that is a grand sport. One of the greatest of the apostles, Saint
+Peter, was an ardent angler, and I am an angler myself." Mentally
+bowing our acknowledgments, we left the church, grateful that so
+eloquent a divine should be appreciative of our favourite sport.
+
+One more anecdote and I have done. We were going back to England on the
+morrow, and were settling up generally, when my gillie Pat said to me,
+"Your honour, would ye buy me a pig?" "And why should I do that, Pat?
+Are you not content with your tip?" "Well, your honour, I don't want
+ye to pay altogither for it, but only to buy it for me." After some
+further conversation I consented to go up to the shanty on the hill
+where his old mother lived. There I found her haggling over the price
+of a sow; she averred that £3 was more than the sow was worth, the man
+was holding out for £3 10_s._ Eventually I became the purchaser at
+£3, and, paying the money, told Pat that as he had been a good gillie
+to me he could have the pig for his own. All the blessings of heaven
+were showered on my head by Pat and his mother; but no sooner had the
+dealer departed than Pat, producing an old stocking, extracted three
+sovereigns therefrom and solemnly handed them to me. Asked what all
+this comedy meant, Pat at once replied, "Ach, sorr, would ye have me
+let the praste know I'd got three sovereigns in my pocket?"
+
+Were the nets at the mouth of the Clady and the Crolly kept within
+reasonable limits, few better rivers for summer angling could be found.
+Having seen their capabilities when the nets were perforce removed
+altogether, I gained an idea of what the sport might be in our sea-girt
+island, with its innumerable rivers, were the angling not throttled by
+the vast array of legalised nets that threaten to destroy, or at any
+rate reduce very heavily, the sport and profit of riparian owners.
+
+That much has been done and that more is being done in this respect
+cannot be gainsaid. The allowance of longer slaps, the purchase
+outright of netting rights in individual cases, are undoubted steps in
+the right direction. But until the process is more universally applied
+its effect cannot be considerable. Salmon coast along such an extent
+of our shores before reaching their destination that bag and coast
+nets miles away may take heavy toll of the fish that are seeking your
+estuary, even though they would have a free run up your river if once
+they could attain it.
+
+Is it too much to hope that some day a wise Government may take
+the matter in hand, not by piecemeal legislation, but with the
+determination of so apportioning and circumscribing the respective
+rights of all concerned and interested, that the price of salmon as an
+article of food may not be increased, and the true rights of both net
+fisherman and angler may be secured?
+
+These two are so much bound up together that over net fishing must
+necessarily and improperly reduce the number of spawning fish, and
+thus injure the rivers which, by furnishing the spawning grounds, are
+the geese that lay the golden eggs. Kill the geese and you get no more
+eggs of gold. Treat the rivers unfairly, either by pollution or by
+over-netting, and not only will the net fishing industry suffer, but
+the general public also, for salmon will rise to famine price.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+SALMON AND FLIES.
+
+
+WHY does a salmon take a salmon fly, and what does it represent to him?
+These are conundrums that are not readily answered. Obviously it cannot
+be because it represents any particular article of food to which salmon
+are accustomed when in the river. If one may presume to dogmatise at
+all upon so abstruse a question, it must be because their curiosity and
+predatory instincts are aroused by a queer object, moving with a series
+of jerks and a somewhat lifelike movement of fibres. Any salmon angler
+with the slightest experience will know what is meant by "hanging
+a fly" properly, and its taking powers as compared with a bunch of
+lifeless feathers floating down stream. So far we are all agreed; but
+when we attempt to discuss the details of the fly itself we are prone
+to differ amazingly.
+
+Some years ago, on the occasion before alluded to, when I was fishing
+the River Clady, in Donegal, the nets having been removed for that
+year, the river was full of fresh-run fish--it was in July. There was
+a pool in which the fish lay in serried rows in the stream, which
+at that point ran under a steep, high bank. I lay down on the bank
+overlooking and a little behind the rows of salmon, and some twenty
+feet above them. By shading my eyes I could make out all the fish as
+clearly as if I were looking at them in an aquarium. I arranged a code
+of signals with my fishing friend, and he went some thirty yards or
+so up the river to fish the pool. As soon as his fly began to work
+over the first line I signalled that he had got the length; there was,
+however, no movement among the fish. I then signalled to cast again
+with the same length of line. As the fly worked over the fish for the
+second time they all seemed to shun it, dropping down stream a foot or
+so, with the exception of one fish, which, separating from the others,
+came up some three feet to follow the fly, eventually leaving it and
+dropping back into his former position. A third passage of the fly
+produced similar results, the same fish moving again. He made a break
+in the water, which my friend saw, but he had come short. A fourth cast
+secured him.
+
+I could come to no other conclusion but that the fish had been bored
+into taking that fly. His curiosity had been excited at first, and
+in ordinary circumstances the fisherman would have known nothing and
+passed on. Does not this tend to show that many a fish may be moved
+without our knowledge, and that a subsequent fly might secure him?
+
+It is often thought that the first fly over a pool stands the best
+chance, provided, of course, that it is properly offered. Personally,
+I would just as soon follow a good angler down a pool as precede him.
+Unless a fish breaks the water in his rise, the fisherman can tell
+little of what is happening below the water level, except when, by
+chance, a glimpse of a silver flash is accorded him. But he may have
+moved a fish with his fly, and, knowing nothing, will have moved a yard
+down stream, his next cast being a yard below the fish. The next fly,
+suitably offered, if it be about the same size, may lure our friend to
+his destruction. Could we all know exactly what is going on under the
+water out of our sight, many more fish would doubtless be brought to
+bank. Of course, on those days when the temperature of both air and
+water have attained that precise relative proportion that seems to
+cause a simultaneous rise of fish in every pool, the first fly will pay
+best, for on such happy occasions that fly, however ill delivered, may
+secure the best fish. And what fisherman cannot recall instances of
+"duffer's luck," the veriest tyro catching, perhaps, the fish of the
+season? I remember once trying to teach a would be angler how to cast,
+and in a most unlikely spot--the river being dead low--was endeavouring
+to instil into him the rhythm of the cast, and trying to make him get
+his line out well behind him. Holding the rod with him, I kept the
+same length of line, steadily flogging the water to the tune of "one,
+two," when, at about the ninth or tenth cast, a travelling fish seized
+our fly, and eventually came to the gaff, a clean-run salmon of 18 lb.
+
+[Illustration: HE MEANS GOING DOWN.]
+
+But surely the precise pattern of the fly, within limits, is of small
+moment; the size, coupled with the proper working of the fibres, is the
+main thing. Every angler has, naturally, his own favourite shibboleth,
+mainly, in my opinion, because he has succeeded with it, and therefore
+perseveres with it far more steadily than with any other pattern. In
+the same way local fetishes are set up, and when once adopted are hard
+to shift. On the Beauly, years ago, fishing on that lovely water in the
+spring, we were using the orthodox spring fly, a sort of exaggerated
+Alexandra, and were mainly catching kelts. When one of us suggested
+a Gordon (having lately used it on the Dee) the fishermen laughed us
+to scorn, and said we might as well fish with it on the high road.
+Nevertheless, the fly was tried, and nearly all the clean fish we got
+that week were secured by it. When our time was up our gillies begged
+for our worn specimens of the goodly Gordon, and the next lessee caught
+all his fish upon flies of that pattern; and, for aught I know, that
+fly may now be reckoned as one of the standard flies of the river.
+
+To revert to the original query. Can it be answered satisfactorily?
+Surely it must represent some food taken whilst the salmon are in
+their sea home; and yet, if this be the only probable answer, how
+comes it that on some rivers, as is the case in Canada, salmon cannot
+be persuaded to rise at any fly of the kind? After all, whether the
+question is unanswerable or no, the glorious uncertainty of salmon
+fishing forms one of its most potent fascinations. If every bungling
+cast hooked a salmon, few people would care for the sport.
+
+All this said, then, what form of fly are we to use? Here we get upon
+very debatable ground, and whatever conclusion we arrive at will
+probably be strenuously opposed. The patterns of salmon flies are
+legion, many differing but slightly from others. Are we to credit
+salmon with such extraordinary intelligence as to believe them able to
+differentiate between varieties of almost similar flies, and to have
+such a correct eye for colour as to refuse a fly because the colour
+of the body or hackle is a shade unorthodox? The size of the fly, no
+doubt, is a most important factor, both as regards the size and
+volume of the river and the time of the year. It would be the height
+of absurdity to use in fine run water in the summer a three inch fly
+that would be a suitable lure on the brawling Thurso in the spring, and
+_vice versâ_. The finer the water the smaller the fly--within reason.
+
+So far, I think, we are all agreed. It is when we attempt to reduce
+the vast number of flies now in vogue that differences of opinion will
+begin to assert themselves.
+
+On the whole, perhaps, there will be less divergence of opinion about
+that singularly fortunate combination of fur, feather, and tinsel,
+termed the Jock Scott. It seems, to an extraordinary degree, to
+be effective on most rivers where the artificial fly is used. The
+combination of colour is most happy, and the fibres of its mixed wing
+give it, in the water, a most life-like appearance. Few anglers would
+care to be without Jock Scotts of sizes. Similarly, in bright water
+the Silver Doctor is a universal favourite, and justly so. As a direct
+contrast the Thunder and Lightning is bad to beat, and I should be
+sorry to be without a Blue Doctor.
+
+Eagles, grey and yellow, hold their sway on the Dee, and the play of
+the feathers seems to be alluring in the quick waters of that river.
+How would such a fly suit the quiet waters of the Avon? You would
+imagine that you might as well fish with a mop-head! The fibres of
+Eagles require fast, fleet water to make them work, and to use an
+Eagle as your lure in slow-running rivers would appear to be most
+inappropriate. The play of the rod point may, however, be substituted
+for the play of the water, and a tempting opening and closing of
+fibrous and mixed winged flies can be obtained by a judicious
+rhythmical raising and lowering of your rod point. Indeed, if you
+watch an experienced salmon fisherman from a distance, you can tell at
+once the kind of water his fly is working through. If the stream be
+sufficiently broken and rapid to work his fly automatically, his rod
+point will be still. If the water should be sluggish, you will note the
+work of the rod top. It would, therefore, be folly to dogmatise on such
+a matter, and I should be sorry to attempt to do so.
+
+Gordons, Butchers, Wilkinsons, and a host of others have their staunch
+advocates.
+
+It is, however, unnecessary to run through the whole gamut; suffice
+it to say that in my opinion, a good selection of, say four or five,
+would be as effective as twenty or thirty. The main difficulty is local
+prejudice, and the uncertain kind of feeling--that if you had not
+discarded local favourites your blank day might have been fruitful.
+Once, however, you have shaken yourself free from this feeling, you
+will very soon gain full confidence in your theory. The blank day that
+you are mourning would probably have been equally blank if you had been
+equipped with all that local fancy could suggest. Can it be seriously
+suggested that salmon can be credited with sufficient intelligence to
+refuse a Silver Doctor or Silver Grey and to accept only a Wilkinson?
+Is it not rather that the fly that was accepted was presented in a most
+alluring manner, whilst the others which were rejected did not come
+within the salmon's ken in such a way as to tempt him? Are we not all
+too prone to change our flies on the slightest provocation, and are we
+not all inclined to have our own favourite fetish--a fly that succeeds
+with us simply because we give it ten chances to one of any other? The
+vagaries of salmon are universally admitted; at one time they will
+allow all lures to pass them unnoticed, and in the next half hour
+may take any fly, of the proper size, suitably offered. The relative
+temperatures of air and water have, I feel convinced, much to say with
+regard to this. The fly in which an angler believes, and with which,
+therefore, he perseveres most, will bring him more fish to bank than
+any other.
+
+It goes without saying that the fly that is most in the water, in the
+fishable parts of the pools, of course, will catch most fish. The
+patient, persistent angler has that great advantage over his less
+energetic brother of the angle. What angler is there, who ties his
+own flies, who has not built up a combination of fur, feathers, and
+silk by the river side, and, on trying the novelty, perhaps after days
+of disappointment, has found it unexpectedly to succeed, and who has
+thereupon fondly imagined that he has found a "medicine," only to be
+equally disappointed the next time it is tried? Scrope, in his day,
+seems to have been satisfied with five patterns. To come to later
+times and later writers, Sir Edward Grey and Mr. Gathorne Hardy both
+advocate four only. The colour of the bottom of the river, of the sky,
+the brightness of the day, or its cloudiness, all these will affect our
+choice of fly, whilst the size and volume of the water will affect our
+choice of size.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+SALMON OF THE AWE.
+
+
+THE River Awe, in Argyllshire, presents, to my mind, the perfection of
+angling water. A fine brawling stream, a constant succession of pools,
+some easy to fish, some only fishable by past masters, lovely, deep,
+roach-backed salmon trout--all these are bad to beat, and when one adds
+the fact that the run of the heavy fish takes place in June and July,
+after the Orchy fish have run through, the two months of all others,
+perhaps, when salmon fishing is enjoyable, I do not think any further
+arguments need be urged to enforce my point.
+
+Were I a rich man--which I am not--I should feel inclined to do my best
+to secure the fishing rights on that merry little river in preference
+to many others of high repute. It is now many years since I first
+wetted a line on the Awe. My old gillie, Black Peter, or the "Otter,"
+as he was frequently called, has, I fear, gaffed his last salmon and
+drunk his last glass of whisky, and (save the mark!) he was mighty good
+at both. I can see him now, in his somewhat tattered kilt, hanging
+on to the porch of the Clachan, trying to steady himself, to give me
+a right cordial welcome when I arrived. No more will he swim the Awe
+when in spate to land a fish for the "Colonel" that had jumped itself
+on the rocks on the opposite side of the river, some mile or two above
+the bridge--a foolhardy feat in such water; but he was always full of
+sport, and not infrequently, alas, equally full of whisky.
+
+The head of water in this bonnie little river is always maintained
+fairly well by its being the affluent of Loch Awe. It is not,
+therefore, so liable to the quick rises and falls of most rivers. The
+loch is fed by the River Orchy, which flows into its north-eastern
+end, whilst the Awe, after passing through the Pass of Brander, forms
+its only outlet. All the Orchy fish, therefore, have to run up the Awe
+to get to their own waters. These fish run early in the spring, never
+dwelling for any length of time in the Awe; and, curiously enough, any
+tyro could at once differentiate between the salmon of the two rivers,
+though they have a common outlet to the sea. The Orchy fish are long,
+lanky, and plain as compared with the short, thick-set beauties of the
+Awe. I recollect once in Ireland coming across the same difference in
+fish using the same _embouchure_. It was in Donegal, where the Crolly
+and the Clady unite at Dum Drum. In this case also one lot of fish are
+poor in shape, whilst the others are of totally different calibre. And,
+moreover, in that case the fish never seem to lose their way. Seldom is
+a Crolly fish found in the Clady, or _vice versâ_. How accurate are the
+instincts of nature!
+
+The lower reaches of the river Awe are very varied and very beautiful.
+The river has churned its way through the solid rock. The two Otter
+Pools, Arroch and the Long Pool, are good examples of the rock-hewn
+gorges. In the latter, a fine quiet stretch of water, where local
+knowledge of the lie of fish is valuable, switching or spey casting is
+necessary if you wish to avoid being constantly hung up in the trees
+above. The Red Pool, just above the stepping stones, can only be fished
+from a plank staging fixed high above the water, and should you hook a
+heavy one at the tail end and he means going down you will be thankful
+enough when you have safely negotiated the return journey on the high
+plank and reached the shore. Even then you have plenty of excitement in
+store before you can hope to see him on the bank. The rocky sides of
+the chasm do not form a racing track. But get him once safely down to
+the Stepping Stone Pool and he should be yours.
+
+This same pool, by the way, is not altogether the place for a beginner,
+for when the river is in order the aforesaid stepping stones have about
+two feet or more of fairly heavy water over them; and as they are
+well-worn boulders, somewhat inclined to be rounded on the top, and
+are placed at a rather inconvenient distance from one another, they are
+apt to make a nervous man think. One friend, I can well remember, when
+I asked him to fish the pool, absolutely declined, asking me if I took
+him for a "blooming acrobat." Below again we come to the Cruive Pool,
+a long cast from another staging, the fish lying on the far side, just
+about as far as an 18 ft. rod will get you. But be there in July when
+the sun is setting, the redder the better, behind the hills on the far
+side, and suddenly the silent oily water becomes broken with countless
+rises, also on the far side. Put on then a cast of sea trout flies and
+use your salmon rod, otherwise you will never reach them. Do not bother
+with a landing net, but run them ashore on the shelving bank below you
+and let your gillie take them off the hooks, and get to casting again
+as soon as you can. The rise, though a good one, lasts, I assure you,
+but a tantalisingly short time, and then the pool is as quiet and oily
+as ever, and you would feel inclined to stake your bottom dollar that
+there was not a sea trout within miles.
+
+The Thunder and Lightning and the Blue Doctor are the local lures, and
+kill well. One year, when the river was low and the fish as stiff as
+pokers, I tied a "medicine" of my own that I fondly hoped would form a
+standard fly on that water, for its effect was admirable at that time.
+It was an olive fly, body olive silk ribbed with silver, tag a golden
+pheasant, dark olive hackles, a light mixed wing with golden pheasant
+topping. Having caught several fish that year with this fly, I got
+Messrs. Eaton and Deller to dress me a stock, and must candidly admit
+that never since then have I caught a single salmon with the "olives."
+
+There are two pools, however, above the Long Pool that I have not
+attempted to describe--the lower one the Yellow Pool, an ideal, leg
+of mutton-shaped piece of water, where a beginner could not well go
+wrong, and above it the Bridge Pool, so called because the railway line
+crosses the neck of it. It was in this pool that I once had a rare bit
+of sport. The whole of the water I have attempted to describe was then
+hotel water, the fishermen staying at the inn having the right to fish
+for a nominal sum--5_s._ a day I think it was. But the river had been
+in fair order, and several good fish had been got. It was then rapidly
+getting on the small side. The records of the previous week having
+been published in the columns of the _Field_, the inevitable result
+was a rush of ardent anglers, and the dozen or so of good pools--nice
+water for two rods--was perfectly inadequate to accommodate the six
+keen fishermen who had arrived to try their luck. It was necessary,
+therefore, to "straw" for the pools, and to my lot fell the Bridge and
+Yellow Pools. The next morning, on reaching my little beat, I found the
+Yellow Pool far too low to be fishable, and there remained only the
+Bridge Pool. Fishing it down carefully twice produced no result, so I
+lit a pipe and clambered up on to the railway bridge to scan the water
+below me.
+
+I was able, after a careful search with shaded eyes, to locate three
+fish, all low down on the far side, lying behind a big stone below the
+water and upon a slab. I could see at once that to reach them I should
+have to do my utmost in the casting way, and should have, moreover,
+to bring my line up through the centre arch of the bridge above me to
+get out the length I wanted; but it seemed to me that if I could get
+my fly to travel and work well over the oily water formed by the stone
+it ought to be irresistible to any well-conducted fish. So, putting on
+a small Thunder, I regained the water side. The second cast brought
+up the smallest of the three fish, who made no bones about it, but
+hooked himself handsomely, and was shortly after disposed of in the
+tail of the pool; he weighed a bare 9 lb. The other two I knew were
+better fish; one I had seen should be over 20 lb., the other, a very
+pale-coloured fish, I could not see distinctly enough to form any idea
+as to his weight. Back I went to my spying point, only just missing
+being caught on the narrow bridge by a passing train, to see, to my
+delight, that the other two fish were there, apparently undisturbed.
+After a few casts the fly went exactly as I could have wished, and
+there was the answering boil. "By Jove! that is the big one I think;
+anyway, he is hooked, and well hooked, too." After a long, splashy
+fight in the pool I got on terms with him, and he began to flounder,
+and then I could see I had the light-coloured fish on. The big one was
+still there, I hoped. The pale fish soon came to the gaff, and, getting
+it nicely home with the left hand, I hauled him on to the bank, a good
+fish, and in good condition, turning the scale at barely 17 lb.
+
+By this time the pool had had a good doing, and I judged it advisable
+to give it a rest. The Yellow Pool, which I had fished down more
+for occupation than for anything else, yielding me no response--and,
+indeed, it was all I expected--I ate my luncheon, lit my pipe, and
+proceeded once more to my vantage spot. There, sure enough, was the
+big fish, undisturbed and immutable. Unable to restrain my impatience,
+I sent a fly (the same one that had accounted for the two other fish)
+on its errand of quest. But there was no movement, no reply, nor was
+there to two other changes of fly I put over him. Having nowhere else
+to fish, and being disinclined to try the Yellow Pool again, as I felt
+sure it would be hopeless, I sat me down to cogitate and look over
+my fly box. The day had become sultry and heavy, and clouds had been
+rolling up, and suddenly there broke a regular deluge of rain, turning
+the pool into a seething mass of big drops. Instinctively I ran for
+shelter under the bridge, but before I reached it changed my mind and
+determined to try once more for the big one in the heavy rainstorm.
+
+Hastily putting on a Thunder and Lightning two sizes larger, I sent him
+out, braving the ducking I was undergoing. The first fly that reached
+the spot was answered by a fine head and tail rise, and I was fast in
+the big one. For a short time he played sulkily, either through not
+grasping the situation or through trying to induce me to believe him to
+be a small one. But I was not to be deluded, and, as he kept edging up
+into the big water coming down the centre arch of the railway bridge, I
+let him have a bit of the butt of my 18 ft. Castleconnell. But, with a
+savage shake of his head and strong whisk of his broad tail, he was now
+thoroughly aroused, and, despite all I could do, up he went, carefully
+threading the central arch and working up for all he was worth into
+the heavy water round the corner. My running line was thus against the
+buttress, but, despite the imminent danger of being cut, there was
+nothing to do but give him "beans." Fortunately for me my lucky star
+was in the ascendant. A convenient patch of moss between the courses
+of the bricks saved my line from the grinding process; the strain of
+my supple rod, combined with the weight of the water, did the trick. I
+felt him yield, reeled up as hard as I could, but, as he turned tail
+and came down (fortunately for me through the same arch), I soon had
+to give up reeling in in order to haul in the line by hand to keep
+touch with him in his downward rush. Steadying the line when he got
+ahead of me, I felt he was still on. Ten minutes of the fight against
+rod, water, and luck had been enough for him, and, rolling on his
+side, he swung round into the slack below me. I had had no chance till
+then of taking my gaff off my back; luckily it came off my shoulders
+quite freely, and the steel went home. As I hauled him out with some
+difficulty, the hook, which had worn a big hole, came out of his jaw;
+so my luck continued to the last. I could not make him scale 30 lb.; he
+was a good 29½ lb., and, inasmuch as I had never landed a fish of 30
+lb. or upwards, that part was somewhat aggravating. But, as I toiled
+home that evening over the three miles of sleepers and rails to the inn
+with the three fish weighing just about half-a-hundredweight, I several
+times wished he had not been quite so heavy.
+
+The upper waters of the Awe, above Awe Bridge, formerly retained by the
+Marquis of Breadalbane in his own hands, and therefore not open to the
+general public, can nowadays be fished from Dalmally Hotel. Through
+that nobleman's enterprise one of the two big cruives has been done
+away with, and there is to be an additional slap nightly, between 6
+p.m. and 6 a.m. The results cannot but be both beneficial and prudent.
+The characteristics of these upper waters are totally distinct from
+those of the lower ones, being unusually broken and rapid, the pools
+small, and not easily distinguishable.
+
+The pent up waters of Loch Awe, finding through the dark Pass of
+Brander their only outlet to the sea, take full advantage of their
+opportunity, and rush and boil over the boulder-bestrewn bed of the
+river in a way that renders it imperative that your gut should be of
+the best, your tackle sound, and your determination great that you will
+not consent to be a mere follower of a hooked fish, but intend to give
+him "beans" when necessary.
+
+The Black and Seal Pools and Verie are fairly typical of the upper Awe
+waters; most of them are fished from planks rigged out on staging,
+and wading is not generally practicable. A hooked fish can never be
+reckoned on as caught, nor can you ever be certain of him until the
+gaff has gone home and your fish lies on the bank beside you. This
+remark, of course, applies in a greater or lesser degree to all salmon
+fishing; but here the perils from heavy water, combined with the
+rugged, rock-strewn bed, afford unusual chances of escape, and at the
+same time add much to the sporting charms of a successful capture.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+DISAPPOINTING DAYS.
+
+
+DISAPPOINTING Days! How well we all know them, and how terribly
+frequent they are. Full of ardour and keen as mustard, we anticipate
+great things, only to find that another day of disappointment is to
+be added to the many already recorded in our angling diary. And it is
+sometimes so difficult to anticipate them; all the omens seem to be
+propitious, and yet the fates are inexorable.
+
+There are days admittedly hopeless, when the river side is only sought
+for its companionship, and for the unknown possibilities of fortune;
+and others that are worse than hopeless, when to try to fish for
+salmon with a fly would be the height of absurdity, as, for instance,
+when the river is in high spate, or so full of snow brue or ice as to
+render your chances almost ridiculous. These, in a sense, are certainly
+disappointing; but it is not of them that I would write, but rather of
+those inexplicable days when all seems to be fairly propitious and yet
+we come home "blank."
+
+Fortunately, fishermen are not easily browbeaten by unkind fortune,
+and these black letter days only serve to give a renewed zest to
+the future, in anticipation of the more fortunate days that we all
+confidently believe to be in store for us.
+
+Everything seems on some occasions to go unaccountably wrong. The water
+may be in order, the fish up, and yet at the end of the day you have
+nothing but mishaps to record, your confident expectations have been
+rudely dissipated, and you have met with a series of misfortunes.
+
+Perhaps on starting you find that you have left your flask or your
+tobacco pouch lying on your mantelpiece, and imprudently have turned
+back to secure them. That circumstance alone, in the eyes of your
+gillie, will prove amply sufficient to give you a "disappointing day."
+You have already discounted your luck, and must not grumble at the
+result. On reaching the water side you find that you have brought
+with you the wrong box of flies, and only have with you the one you
+had discarded overnight as containing those of a size too large.
+Well, you must make the best of it, mount the least objectionable of
+those at your disposal, and proceed to wade out into the stream with
+half your confidence gone. You soon realise that your waders, which
+had already given you warning indications of hard wear, are leaking
+somewhat unpleasantly. After working your way half down the pool you
+discover that your pipe is smoked out, and as you are in need of the
+consoling influence of tobacco, you propose to refill it, proceeding
+to knock out the ashes on the butt of your rod; in doing so the pipe
+slips through your fingers and disappears in the stream at your feet.
+It is impossible to recover it, so you are pipeless, and therefore
+inconsolable all day.
+
+Some disappointments are sheer ill fortune; some we bring upon
+ourselves. You are, for example, casting mechanically, and therefore
+badly; moreover, you are not watching your fly, nevertheless you get
+a rise. You step back a yard or so, in order to be sure of getting
+the length right for the next cast, and in so doing forget the slimy
+green boulder that you had just negotiated on your way down. An awkward
+struggle, in which you have to use the butt of your rod as a stick to
+avoid an upset, does not serve to mend matters, but rather to unsteady
+you the more. At any rate, you have escaped a real ducking and are
+proportionately thankful.
+
+Then, your mental balance being somewhat upset, you cast over your
+rising fish; he comes up well, a good boil, but you are too anxious
+and keen, and fairly pull the fly out of the fish's mouth. You have
+pricked him, and you will hardly get another rise out of him. Still
+there is a Will-o'-the-wisp kind of luck awaiting you, for near the
+tail of the pool you get a fair head-and-tail rise, and are fast in a
+good fish. He won't come up into your pool, but insists on making down,
+through the broken water, into the pool below. Having guided him to the
+best of your ability through the intricacies of the run, you hasten to
+get ashore to get on terms with him, keeping your rod point well up.
+More haste, less speed. The fact of your mental balance being upset
+reacts upon your bodily balance, and you catch the toe of your brogue
+on a submerged rock whilst working your way ashore, and this time you
+go a real "howler." Thoroughly wet, with a big chunk cut out of your
+wrist in your fall, you pick yourself up to find that you have broken
+your favourite rod point. Disconsolately you begin to reel up, the
+broken top meanwhile floating on your line in the water.
+
+Still a gleam of luck: the fish is on, and, moreover, is complacently
+careering round the head of the new pool. Thoroughly aroused, you take
+the greatest care in getting on to terms with him again. Your rod has
+now a somewhat quaint appearance, like a dismasted yacht. Half the
+play of it is gone, and the top swirls about on the water in a most
+disconcerting manner. With set teeth, you grimly determine that, come
+what may, you will land that salmon. And you meet with some measure of
+reward, for after a somewhat prolonged duel, he begins to flop about on
+the surface, and to show unmistakable signs of having had enough of it.
+
+With the greatest care you select the best spot for gaffing him, and
+successfully get the gaff free from your shoulder. Your now stiff and
+stodgy rod is, however, not best suited for bringing him in to the
+gaff. It is some little time before you get anything, like a fair
+chance. Then, with the rod in your left hand, your trusty gaff in
+the right, he is led in, down stream, and he flops about. The hold,
+alas, has been somewhat worn, and, just as you are making ready for
+your stroke, the fish makes one more roll and surge and is free. A
+wild scrape with the gaff only scores a scale or two from his side,
+and, slowly gliding out of sight into the deep water, he disappears
+for ever. You feel that you have only yourself to thank for such a
+_dénouement_, but that is scant consolation.
+
+[Illustration: THE FALL'S POOL.]
+
+Damp and annoyed, you sit yourself down by the river side to try to
+make matters straight. Where is that waxed silk? At home, of course.
+So you have to content yourself with sacrificing a good length of the
+taper of your line in order to make a temporary splice.
+
+Taking all things into consideration, your efforts to rig up a jury top
+are reasonably successful, and it might yet kill a fish. If only you
+had a pipe to console yourself with, things might look brighter and
+better; but the loss of your pipe is an undeniably severe one. The pool
+that you are now fishing has a shelving stone bank on your side, the
+deep water being opposite to you. It is ideal water to fish, as the fly
+works out of the heavy stream into the shallowing water on your side.
+The wading, moreover, is easy, and the pool a long one, so that there
+is every probability of your being able to yet retrieve your fortunes,
+and of being able to account for a heavy fish before you have done with
+it.
+
+Still keeping mounted the fly that, contrary to your expectations,
+had already deluded the former fish, you wade out and recommence
+operations. The cast, however, demands a certain length of line to
+cover the fish, and your rod is hardly the man it was; the breeze has
+increased a good deal, and is directly behind you; still, you manage to
+cover the water fairly well, and are beginning to get on better terms
+with yourself. A few yards down there is a good rise and a welcome
+heavy "rugg." The fly, however, comes away, and you are left lamenting.
+The long pool is steadily fished down, and some hundred yards or so
+lower you get another bold and confident rise. You strike, and the fly
+again comes back. Reeling up, sadly you wade ashore, and, on examining
+your fly, find the barb gone.
+
+In all probability it was broken at the head of the pool on the
+shelving bank behind you, the strong wind at your back and the long
+cast with a weak rod having brought about the misfortune. Why, in the
+name of goodness, had you not examined the fly when it came back after
+your last rise? No doubt but that the barb had gone long before that.
+Mentally cursing your carelessness, objurgating Dame Fortune, and
+longing for the companionship of a pipe, there is nothing to be done
+but to mount another fly and to fish, albeit somewhat mechanically, the
+next stretch of water. But there is now no response. That inexplicable
+co-relation between the temperature of the air and the water that seems
+to cause salmon to rise has undergone some modification, the breeze has
+dropped, and the mists are beginning to rise. Do what you will, not a
+fish will move.
+
+Had your luck been in the ascendant, or had you paid more respect to
+the superstitions of your attendant gillie, things might have been
+so different. You have had three good chances, each of which, under
+normal circumstances, might have been fairly expected to score, and
+that with flies that, in your judgment, were a size too large. Fate had
+determined that you were to have a "disappointing day," and you cannot
+say that you have not scored one.
+
+In September, 1902, having received an invitation from an old friend to
+fish one of the upper beats of the Spean, I journeyed up North, full of
+eagerness. I had long wished to try that river. My host had informed me
+that that river was low, but that everything pointed to broken weather
+and rain; and though this forecast was true as regards some portions of
+Great Britain, the change never came during the fortnight that I spent
+on Spean side, that bonnie river getting finer and finer day by day,
+until at last it became a mere shadow of its former self. At the time
+of my arrival everything looked promising. Heavy clouds were gathering,
+and it looked as if the promised rainfall could not be long delayed.
+At the lodge I found, besides my host, another angler whom I am also
+privileged to call an old friend, and in such company I knew that,
+whether sport were good or no, we should at least have a jolly time.
+That evening we discussed flies and angling details as only fishermen
+can, and with a last look out of the window at the murky sky, and a tap
+to my barometer as I turned in somewhat early, looking forward to the
+morrow with the keenest anticipation.
+
+Early astir next morning, I drew up my blinds to find an almost
+cloudless sky and a bright sun. All the evening promise had been
+dissipated, and the rain-laden clouds had wandered out to sea to
+discharge their precious stores where least required. The river, though
+small, was, nevertheless, still fishable, and there were plenty of
+salmon up. At the lowest pool on the beat I put up my rod and fixed
+up the local "medicine"--a Thunder and Lightning--and, wading out,
+fished the pool down carefully, without result. My host then fished it,
+also blank. Several fish had shown at the tail, but we could not get a
+rise out of them. Then we wandered up the beat, trying all the likely
+pools in turn. In the mill pool I managed to get into a small salmon,
+about 7 lb. in weight, and duly got him out; otherwise our efforts
+were entirely unrewarded. It was a great thing to learn the pools, and
+to know where it was safe to wade, etc., and so I felt that the day
+was not a lost one as far as I was concerned, though of course less
+interesting to my friend S. and to my host. As we came home the clouds
+again began to gather, to lure us, Will-o'-the-wisp-like, on to further
+baseless hope, as the following bright, hot morning amply testified.
+
+And so the days wore on, rocks gradually appearing where water had
+flowed before, shallows becoming stony strands, and the fish more
+pool-locked than ever. Finer grew the tackle used, smaller the flies.
+We were really learning the geography of the bed of the river to some
+weariness. After a few days S. gave up trying for the salmon, and
+contented himself with trout waders and a trout rod as being more
+productive of amusement. Being, however, of a more dogged temperament,
+I stuck to the salmon, fishing with the smallest flies I could get,
+and almost trout gut. By means of these allurements I did succeed in
+amusing myself, rising and hooking quite a respectable number of fish,
+but somehow or other I never could get a good hold of them; all were
+lightly hooked, and got off in playing or eventually broke me. One fish
+I was particularly annoyed with; he was a heavy one, well over 20 lb.,
+and might have been 30 lb. I had often seen him showing in the pool at
+the end of the Red Bank. This formed really the head of the Mill Pool,
+but was now cut off from the main part of the Mill Pool by a daily
+lowering shallow some 1 ft. to 18 in. deep, through which sharp-cutting
+rocks jutted at intervals. In mid-stream quite a highish bank of stones
+was now disclosed, and on our side had quite cut off the flow of water
+and formed a large backwater. The pool was fishable with a short line,
+and the high, rocky bank behind formed a good shelter whilst working
+down the very rough bank side. About four o'clock one afternoon I saw
+my friend show twice in the head of the pool, and determined to give
+him another trial with the little Popham that had already risen fish.
+He took it grandly, with a head-and-tail rise, right up in the roughish
+water in the neck, and then proceeded to sail round the diminished
+proportions of the deep hole. He played very heavily, but did not
+jigger or show any signs of being lightly hooked. After some time of
+this kind of work, which was taking but little out of him, my light
+cast forbidding any heroic measures on my part, I began to wonder how
+I could manage to kill him. He could have got up into the pool above,
+where it would have been an easier matter to deal with him, but no arts
+of mine could induce him up stream. I thought that if I could get him
+down into the backwater I could more readily manage to play and kill
+him, so I walked him steadily down stream, and he followed for some
+distance like a lamb. Suddenly, however, he made up his mind for a run,
+or, realising the object of my manoeuvre, off he went, churning his
+way across the wide shallow, his back fin almost showing, bound for
+the main stream on the other side. Sixty yards of line were soon gone,
+then seventy, then eighty, and, as I could not follow, it was merely
+a question of when he would break me, when apparently he changed his
+mind, turned clean round and ran back through the shallow towards me
+for all he was worth. Holding the rod as high as I could to prevent
+my line being cut by the half-submerged, jagged rocks, and paying in
+line as hard as I could at the same time, I got him within twenty
+yards of the spot where he was hooked, the little Popham holding well,
+and with no slack line. Just as my gillie and I were congratulating
+ourselves that we had him now, up came the point of my rod, and he was
+gone. The light cast had been terribly frayed by his mad rush across
+the shallow water, and he retained my Popham and left me lamenting. It
+certainly was hard lines, when all the dangers of the run had been so
+successfully overcome and hooked fish were so scarce.
+
+It is useless, however, to repine in such circumstances, and after all,
+in a very dead time, he had given me a good twenty minutes to half an
+hour of sport. My friend S. came up just as we parted company, and
+condoled with me. That same afternoon my host managed to land a 21 lb.
+fish on a stouter tackle, and he was not very red--the fish I mean,
+not my host!--although he must have been up some time.
+
+The same thing went on all the next week. A few desultory showers did
+not help us much, and at the end of a fortnight's solid work I could
+only show two small salmon of 7 lb. apiece, my host one of 21 lb., and
+S., who had confined his attention to the trout after the first few
+days, had not landed any fish. And so it is--too often, alas!--that
+our hopes are doomed to disappointment. There were the fish, plenty
+of them; but also there were the gradually dwindling river and the
+expanding river bed. Nothing was wanting save a kindly and copious fall
+of rain--so much needed by three ardent anglers--rain that was falling
+only too copiously down South, whilst the normally wet North-West coast
+of Scotland was languishing for want of it.
+
+A dear fishing friend of mine took a rod for February one year, and
+lived at Brawl Castle for the month at the rate of about £1 per day.
+During the whole month the river and even Loch More were ice-bound, and
+his rods reposed in the box. The trip must have cost him the best part
+of £100. So our Spean experience was as nothing to his.
+
+And these disappointments make an admirable foil for those happy,
+though not too frequent, times when, for a wonder, river, fish, and
+weather are all we could desire them to be. How little we should value
+them were they of constant recurrence. So, consoling ourselves with
+these reflections, we enjoy to the full the pleasure of the company of
+kindred spirits, tie flies, grease lines, and fettle up rods generally,
+yarn away our fishermen's tales, drink nightly the toast of "Rain, and
+lots of it," and retire at night, confident, despite all, of the morrow.
+
+Perchance your next holiday up North you may find your pet river in
+sullen, heavy flood, the skies pouring down upon the devoted hills a
+constant deluge. Each day you mark on the river bank the water level,
+only to find your mark submerged the next day. Supposing even it were
+to stop now. Could the river fine down sufficiently before the end of
+your stay to enable you to have a glimmering hope of a fish? It is
+possible, but doubtful. Next day's deluge settles the matter, and you
+are done. But still, it is a poor heart that never rejoices. Next
+time, after such a run of bad luck, you are bound to have an innings.
+Men who have the instincts of sportsmen and who deserve the name have
+a marvellous power of rising superior to adverse circumstances, and
+consequently get their reward, whilst the dead-hearted give it up
+as a bad job. Come good or bad luck, let your heart be in the right
+place. You will be able to extract from either much enjoyment and some
+experience, and will be just as keen to take the luck that comes the
+very next opportunity you get of testing it.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+SEA TROUT FISHING AND ITS CHANCES.
+
+
+FOR his size and weight there is no more sporting fish in the wide
+world than the sea trout. His play when hooked is so full of vivacity,
+so strenuous, you never know what he is going to do next. Half the time
+of the contest he spends out of the water in the air. He rushes hither
+and thither in the most unexpected manner, and having no particular
+stronghold or shelter to make for, such as his cousins, the brown
+trout, possess in their rivers, he tries by resourceful activity to rid
+himself of the irksome restraint of the rod and line. His rise, too, is
+so determined and so dashing--no quiet sucking down of a dun without
+much perceptible body movement, but rather a rapid dash to secure an
+article of food before his comrades can get it. Not much need to strike
+with him; he hooks himself pretty effectually by his own efforts. Given
+a single-handed split cane rod, fine tackle, and plenty of fresh run
+sea trout in a Highland river, and you have the prospect of as good a
+day's sport as any you ever enjoyed. You never know what the next cast
+will produce; it may be a half-pounder or something twelve times as big.
+
+The worst of sea trout, from the angler's point of view, is that they
+are rather gregarious and keep in shoals; they are always anxious to
+move up to the still deeps they love so well, and you may just miss the
+shoal--they may be just above your water. But if you do happen to hit
+them off, you will have no reason to regret it. Not many seasons ago I
+was invited by a friend to shoot with him on one of the many Western
+islands near Mull. Just before I reached the lodge, in my somewhat long
+drive up from the landing place, I met my friend, rod in hand, by a
+deep-looking, leg-of-mutton-shaped pool where his stream found its
+outlet into the brackish waters of the arm of the sea that looked like
+a land-locked loch.
+
+"Get out of the trap; I've got a treat for you," were his first words
+of greeting; and then he explained that they had had, the evening
+before, the first run of the sea trout, and that, standing on a little
+rock in the brackish water, he had caught quantities of fine fish.
+Nothing loth to stretch my arms and legs, I took the proffered rod
+with many thanks, and fished the pool down carefully without a rise
+of any kind, or a sign of a fish. Putting on another fly, I tried it
+down again, and also the brackish water at its mouth, with similar
+results. My friend had foreborne to throw a fly on it until my arrival,
+and so he chaffed me unmercifully at my want of success after the
+extraordinary sport he had experienced the afternoon before. I told him
+that I did not believe there was a trout in the water, and as he had
+the netting rights, and had come down in the boat with the nets in it,
+we carefully netted the pool. My host was so convinced that the sea
+trout were there, that he offered to bet me any odds against a blank
+draw. He would, however, have lost had I taken his bet, for sure enough
+there was not a single fish in the whole pool. Whilst I made my way up
+to the lodge, he went up to try some of the higher pools, but not a
+rise did he get. The whole big run, shoal like, had run clean up into a
+small lochan, of which his stream was the outlet.
+
+But when you happen to find them just in the right place, where you
+are, then you may congratulate yourself, if you have not too big a
+rod with you, for half the pleasure of angling is to suit your rod
+and tackle to the river and the fish. It is giving the show away and
+discounting half your sport to be "over-rodded." To fish, for instance,
+in the upper beats of, say, the Helmsdale, in Sutherland, with an 18
+ft. rod is absurd. A 16 ft. or 14 ft. grilse rod will enable you to
+cover the water well, and the sport you will get from the 9 lb. to
+14 lb. salmon in the well-stocked river will be greatly enhanced. A
+powerful 18 ft. Castleconnel will choke the fish unadvisedly. You might
+as well use a sledge hammer to crack an egg. So, too, with sea trout,
+a 14 ft. double-handed rod robs you of the better part of the sport
+and gives you no real satisfaction. On the other hand, if, as you may
+well do, you happen to get into a grilse or small salmon with your
+small rod and forty yards of line, then the sport you get will be worth
+living for, and will often recur to your remembrance in after times.
+You will need all your knowledge and resource not to be broken; you
+will in all probability have no gaff with you, and will have to tail
+him out, or, better still, persuade him to kick himself ashore on a
+shelving beach when played out. And it is extraordinary how little
+pressure of the rod is needed in such cases to keep his head the right
+way, and each kick and wriggle sends him further up the beach. Then
+getting between him and the river, having laid down your rod, you can
+put him out of his misery and despatch him.
+
+A few seasons ago, when grouse shooting in the North, I was kindly
+given an opportunity to fish the Glentana beats of the Dee. The river
+was low, and as it was then early September, what fish were up were
+red and ugly, but a change to the river side was welcome, and I had
+never seen the pools in that part of the water. So, donning my waders,
+I took with me a 10 ft. 6 in. rod, cane-built, by Walbran, some light
+grilse and trout casts, and the smallest grilse flies I had by me. I
+also fortunately put in my bag a small box of Test flies. Nothing had
+been done for days in any of the Ballater waters, or indeed in any
+part of that brawling river Dee. The few anglers who had gone out had
+religiously kept to the orthodox salmon rod, salmon gut, and big flies,
+and had caught nothing. When I got out of the dogcart and put up my
+little rod I noticed a smile upon the river keeper's face, but nothing
+daunted thereby, I followed him down the slopes to a beautiful pool
+below.
+
+I put on a baby Jock Scott, and fished the pool most carefully. At
+the tail of the pool a big red fish gave a sullen kind of plunge, but
+not at my fly, for it was not near him at the time. I put the Jock
+Scott over him without result, and then tried him with a tiny Silver
+Doctor; but he ignored that also; and so I wandered down from pool to
+pool, learning a good deal of the river bed, owing to the lowness of
+the water. After a bit, I saw what I took to be the rise of a trout on
+the far side, so taking off my "Doctor," I opened my Test fly box and
+examined its contents. I hit off a gold-ribbed hare's ear, dressed on
+a 00 hook, which I thought might do, and wading out, had to make my
+little rod do all it could to reach the required spot. I fished the
+water above first, in order to soak my fly and make it sink. When I
+reached the place where I thought I had seen the rise, I fished with
+more care, and soon as my fly was working round below me, I felt a
+vigorous tug; something had taken it under water without showing. I
+was soon convinced that it was no trout that had laid hold, and got
+ashore as quickly as I could, but I had only forty yards of line and a
+little backing, so was soon compelled to take to the water again, as
+my fish was playing sullenly on the far side of the stream. I put on
+what pressure I dare in order to get on better terms with him, and this
+roused him a bit, for a vigorous run up to the head of the pool nearly
+ran my line out, although I was wading as deep as I dared do. My friend
+the keeper now became interested, and waded in alongside me.
+
+Though big, the fish was rather craven-hearted, and I was soon able to
+get ashore again. However, his weight was great, and when he got into
+the stream down he went into the next pool, I following, rod point up
+and reel freely running. There were about forty minutes of this slow
+kind of play and several incursions into the water, and then I began
+to see my backing on the reel perilously diminishing. The 00 hook,
+however, still held well, and at last I had the satisfaction of seeing
+the big brute floundering on the surface. The keeper, meanwhile, had
+gone lip to the house to get a gaff, and, walking backwards from the
+river, I tried to drag the exhausted salmon within his reach; but,
+although the rod point was about level with the reel, the dead weight
+of the fish was more than I could manage. So my friend the keeper,
+deploring the irreparable damage that must have been done to my rod,
+waded in, thigh deep, and drove the steel into about as ugly and as red
+an old cock fish as I have ever seen. His under jaw was crooked, and
+he looked like an evil monster. He weighed just 17½ lb. As soon as the
+strain was off my Walbran rod it sprang up as straight and as limber as
+ever, to the great astonishment of the keeper, who had, oddly enough,
+never come across a rod of that description. Burying our red fish in
+the bracken, we went down a bit lower, and, two pools below the house,
+got out another cock fish of 10 lb., and returning home secured a third
+in the very same pool where I had caught the first; this proved to
+be a hen fish of 12 lb. They were all red and ugly, but the last one
+was, comparatively speaking, quite passable. As soon as she was gaffed
+we looked up the first fish; he had turned quite black, and was a
+gruesome sight. So, leaving the three fish with the keeper, to kipper
+or do what he liked with, I got into the dogcart and drove home. Of
+course, these fish would not have come to the gaff in the way they did
+had they been spring fish, or lately arrived in the water; but, all the
+circumstances being taken into account, the 21st September, 1900, will
+always recur to my mind as a real sporting day. Sundry other salmon has
+this little rod accounted for, and it is as true as steel and fit for
+any fight.
+
+Such incidents as these add very materially to the interest of sea
+trout fishing, for, as I have said, you never can tell what your next
+cast may produce. It is small wonder, therefore, that good sea trout
+angling is so eagerly sought after and so hard to get. Your best chance
+of getting such sport is to go a bit further afield, to the Shetland
+Isles, the Orkneys, or somewhere a little out of the beaten track.
+
+[Illustration: FINIS]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+_L'ENVOI_
+
+
+_Seasons come and go, each in its turn bringing us nearer to the last,
+those that remain for our enjoyment growing steadily and inevitably
+fewer. But the instinct of sport, inbred in most of us, dies hard. I,
+too, would echo Mr. Sydney Buxton's words, and hope that when my time
+comes, and my loved rods hang useless in their cases, Old Charon will
+permit me to loiter awhile on the Styx, and cast one last fly on its
+dark and turgid waters._
+
+
+
+
+ALSO BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
+
+UNIFORM WITH "CHATS ON ANGLING."
+
+STALKING SKETCHES.
+
+With Numerous Illustrations by the Author.
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+       I.--INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER.
+      II.--THE FOREST AND SANCTUARY.
+     III.--THE STALKER.
+      IV.--PERSONAL EQUIPMENT.
+       V.--THE SHOT AND THE GRALLOCH.
+      VI.--DEER AND THEIR ANTLERS.
+     VII.--PECULIARITIES OF DEER.
+    VIII.--HIND SHOOTING.
+      IX.--DEERHOUNDS AND WOUNDED DEER.
+       X.--THE SPIRACULA OF DEER.
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+    OVER THE PASS (Frontispiece).
+    BY THE LOCH SIDE.
+    BRINGING HIM IN.
+    THE POOL IN THE SANCTUARY.
+    A FAMILY PARTY.
+    A GOOD REST.
+    CREEPING DOWN THE HILL.
+    SPYING.     A WET CRAWL.
+    A DOWN-HILL SHOT.
+    HEAD OF RED DEER STAG (44 Points).
+    CURIOUS ONE-HORNED STAG.
+    DEFIANCE.
+    THE HUMMEL AND THE HORNED STAG.
+    SENTINELS OF THE FOREST.
+    CHILDREN OF THE MIST.
+    THE LAST ACT.
+
+
+_EXTRACTS FROM PRESS NOTICES._
+
+"The book will be found a welcome addition to the sportsman's
+library."--_Liverpool Mercury._
+
+"The author's full-page illustrations are delightful things--pictures
+in the best sense of the word."--_Newcastle Chronicle._
+
+"Capt. Hart-Davis's delightfully breezy pages contain, besides a
+quantity of advice to novices, and, for that matter, others besides
+novices, a number of excellently written accounts of stalks and good
+stories of the 'hull.' The writer's pencil sketches add not a little
+to the attractiveness of a volume that is sure to take its place
+on the shelves of the enthusiastic stalker.... Every page contains
+sound and wholesome advice on the sport and everything connected with
+it."--_County Gentleman._
+
+"The seventeen full-page illustrations are a pleasure to look at,
+filled as they are with the very breath and spaciousness of the lonely
+haunts of the deer."--_Glasgow Herald._
+
+"Such a compleat stalker is Capt. Hart-Davis, and many who
+view his hardier craft with scant interest, or even with scant
+sympathy, may spend a delightful hour in looking over his admirable
+drawings."--_Yorkshire Observer._
+
+"The prime essential to make a book worth reading is that the author
+should have familiar knowledge of his subject; but when he adds
+just that degree of enthusiasm which renders him eloquent as well,
+the reader deems himself fortunate. Capt. Hart-Davis, however, adds
+a third grace, for he is his own artist likewise, and has drawn a
+series of beautiful illustrations, rich in the true atmosphere of the
+Highlands."--_Notts Guardian._
+
+"Without bringing Landseer into comparison, there are a number of
+drawings here, which for their presentment of stag and hind, of
+moor and fell, and misty mountain side may fairly be placed against
+anything of the kind from the pencils of Ansdell or Frederick
+Taylor."--_Bookseller._
+
+"One great merit that the book possesses is originality, for although
+the subject is by no means new, the author's treatment of it imparts
+a freshness which carries the reader from page to page with sustained
+interest."--_The Field._
+
+"His chapters on 'Personal Equipment' and 'The Shot' are excellent, and
+ought to be closely studied by all novices at this sport."--_Sporting
+and Dramatic News._
+
+"Capt. Hart-Davis deserves thanks not only for what he has written and
+sketched, but also for what his book suggests of the sport which holds
+the first place in Scotland."--_Land and Water._
+
+"The surroundings of stags in the forests of Scotland are excellently
+represented in 'Stalking Sketches,' a reprint of articles contributed
+to _The Field_, illustrated by the author's drawings, which for the
+most part have considerable artistic merit. The articles justify
+republication, being pleasantly written and full of sound advice....
+The volume is attractively got up, and should please many besides
+deerstalkers."--_Athenæum._
+
+"Capt. Hart-Davis has now published in book form his very interesting
+series of 'Stalking Sketches' which originally appeared in _The
+Field_. The volume is very well illustrated with a number of full-page
+original pictures by the author. Everyone interested in our forests and
+stalking, whether through the good fortune of personal experience, or
+merely through the literature of sport, will welcome these articles in
+their present form."--_Dundee Advertiser._
+
+"Sportsmen who love the red deer will give a ready welcome to this
+readable book. It is on every page lively with the interest born of an
+intimate practical knowledge of the sport, and is illustrated by many
+drawings, which are not only noticeable from their artistic merits,
+but have a didactic value of their own for naturalists and young
+sportsmen. The work makes a valuable addition to the literature of its
+subject."--_Scotsman._
+
+
+    London: HORACE COX, Windsor House, Bream's Buildings, E.C.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Transcriber's Notes:
+
+Obvious punctuation errors repaired. All weights have a space between
+the number and the "lb." This was also done with "ft." and "in."
+
+Page 56, duplicate word "a" removed from text. Original read (a a
+smiling rubicund)
+
+Page 63, "circumstanses" changed to "circumstances" (upon several
+circumstances)
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Chats on Angling, by H. V. Hart-Davis
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 43874 ***