18 THE BORDER ANGLER. 



success in it, so miicli depends upon the personal 

 qualifications of the angler and so little upon any well- 

 ascertained or definite principles, that the good salmon- 

 fisher is generally a law unto himself, regardless of the 

 maxims of Scrope, Stoddart, and Ephemera. On 

 Tweedside, you will find a man fishing on one " water" 

 with flies that would be rejected (not perhaps by the 

 fish but by the fisherman) on the next ; and all that 

 is generally agreed to may be summed up in a few 

 simple rules laying down the necessity of light and 

 far casting, of regulating the motions given to the fly 

 according as you are fishing for kelts, for clean salmon, 

 or for grilse, and according as you are fishing in stream 

 or pool, and of using large flies in spring, small ones 

 in summer, and again larger ones in autumn. And the 

 best salmon-fisher in the world might, after all, in the 

 Season when the fish are scarce in Tweed, if he were 

 not intimately acquainted with the water he was fish- 

 ing, throw away all his labour and pains for nothing, 

 while an indifierent angler, knowing the water, might 

 be successful. It is altogether impossible for a stranger 

 at once to fix upon those places which are worth fish- 

 ing ; and although a general knowledge of the habits 

 of the fish may teach him what are the likely places, 

 it is quite possible that he may spend his time in 

 anxiously thrashing where salmon never lie, and may 

 pass over those casts where they are almost always to 

 be found. A Tweedside fisherman can point out almost 

 with certainty, from his long observation, the spot 

 where a salmon is l}^ng, if there is a salmon in his 

 district ; and these places vary with the state of the 

 water, one cast being excellent while the river is 

 large, another while it is small. 



