MR. STODD ART'S MONSTER EEL. 161 



a few grilses into the pools of the Teviot, but they are 

 thinly distributed, and the angler must not be san- 

 guine of success with his salmon-rod. Great numbers 

 of kelts have, however, hitherto been killed in this 

 river, in the spring, with the rod; and, before they 

 took a thought and mended, the kelt-killing gentry 

 of Koxburghshire to whom we have formerly alluded 

 used to commit deadly ravages in it with the leister. 

 In the spring of 1857 a feat in kelt-fishing was per- 

 formed in the lower part of the Teviot by Mr. Purves 

 of Kelso. We have mislaid the paragraph from the 

 Kelso papers which chronicled the deed ; but it was, 

 we think, from Heaton-mill cauld near Koxburgh, that 

 in a few hours one afternoon he took eight fish, weigh- 

 ing altogether 126 rbs. Two of them, kelts though 

 they were, weighed 26ft>s. each, two others werelGBbs., 

 and the rest were smaller. It was on a frosty day, 

 and Mr. Purves was angling with minnow. In the 

 same piece of water Mr. Stoddart has achieved some 

 of his most remarkable victories. We have inciden- 

 tally alluded to his eel, which took a gorge-bait with 

 which he was trolling for pike, swallowed it, ran off 

 in extraordinary style, and finally, finding no other 

 way of escape, bolted the whole nine inches of brass 

 wire, and bit through the line. Much amazed, Mr. 

 Stoddart threw in six set-lines, each with a trout and 

 wire-armed hook at the end, and went on his way 

 trouting. When he returned, and proceeded to draw 

 his lines, he found the first five docked of their bait and 

 hook, the whole having been swallowed and the cords 

 bit through by some monster, as had happened to his 



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