CHAPTER VI 



THE GRAYLING AT CARIBOU 

 CROSSING 



AINT AMBROSE of fragrant memory, fisher- 

 man of old, and likewise a fisherman of men, 

 *' magnanimous, plaintive, and intense," once 

 declared in his town of Treves in Gaul (Augusta 

 trevirorum), by the Black Gate, fifteen hundred years ago, 

 that the grayling was the " flower of fishes." And with this 

 gracious word, being called to be Bishop of Milan, the 

 blessed saint drops to the southward and out of our history, 

 which must wander far away in wilder scenes 'mid rougher 

 company. In any event, the grayling is certainly the most 

 choice, the most unhackneyed, of all the prizes of the angler, 

 and wherever it is found, it finds its group of appreciative 

 admirers. 



The Latin name of the grayling, Thymalhts, comes from 

 the fact that when fresh it has the odor of wild thyme, a 

 fragrant mint common on the brooksldes of northern Eng- 

 land. Shakespeare knew on the Avon In Stratford, a " bank 

 on which the wild thyme grows," and I, too, have found in 

 fragrant Warwickshire many a slope which well answers to 

 Shakespeare's description. 



But though the grayling is a sweet fish, pleasant to smell 

 as to look upon when it comes fresh from the ripple, only 

 those who know and love It are able to detect the fragrant 

 odor which the ancients knew so well. 



The grayling is a cousin to the trout. Its mouth Is smaller, 

 its teeth are not so many, or so sharp, and it has neither the 

 strength, nor the speed, nor the voracity of the least of the 



37 



