252 • SALMONIA. [ninth day. 



surely you will allow that the full liberty of the press, 

 even though it sometimes degenerates into licentious- 

 ness, and though it may sometimes be improperly 

 used by the influence of wealth, power, or private 

 favour, is yet highly advantageous, and even essential 

 to the existence of a free country : and, useful as it 

 may be to the population, it is still more useful to 

 the government ; to w r hom, as expressing the voice of 

 the people, though not always vox Dei, it may be 

 regarded as oracular or prophetic. But let us 

 change our conversation, which is neither in time 

 nor place. 



POIET. — This river must be inexhaustible for 

 sport ; I have nowhere seen so many fish. 



HAL. — However full a river may be of trout and 

 grayling, there is a certain limit to the sport of the 

 angler, if continuous fishing be adopted in the same 

 pools. Every fish is in its turn made acquainted by 

 diurnal habit with the artificial fly, and either taken 

 or rendered cautious ; so that in a river fished much 

 by one or two good anglers, many fish cannot be 

 caught, except under peculiar circumstances of very 

 windy, rainy, or cloudy weather, when many flies 

 come on; or at night, or at the time the water is 

 slightly coloured by a flood, or when fish change 

 their haunts in consequence of a great inundation. 

 In the Usk, in Monmouthshire, when it was very 



