54 GRILSE STRONGER THAN SALMON. 



accounts — the higlily exaggerated accounts — 

 he has heard of the agility and strength of that 

 fish. That it is strong and agile, cannot be gain- 

 sayed : if it were not, angling for it would not be 

 the exciting sport it is. But with all its strength 

 and agility, it must succumb to the good rod 

 and line. In my opinion it is as easy, and fre- 

 quently more so, to catch, by fly-fishing, a salmon 

 of fifteen pounds' weight, with a good rod of seven- 

 teen feet in length and other tackle to match, as 

 it is to kill a three-pound trout with the ordi- 

 nary trouting fly-tackle. The strength and en- 

 during powers of salmon are not to be calculated 

 by size. I have seen a four-pound grilse combat 

 with the angler for twenty minutes, and a twelve- 

 pound salmon yield to the same rod and line in 

 less than ten minutes. I just now used the 

 term " black " grilse. I'll explain why I did so. 

 I hold that, generally speaking, a " black " grilse, 

 of seven or eight pounds in weight, is stronger, 

 and certainly more agile, than a fresh-run salmon 

 of eighteen pounds. This seems strange, par- 

 ticularly when the salmon is not only by far 

 the larger, but is the better conditioned fish of 

 the two. Yes, in better condition for the table, 

 but not for a struggle with the angler. The 

 fatted calf, forced to extraordinary effort, will 



