CLEAR WATERS 



,' replied my friend. * Good Heavens ! ' said I, 



for the name was a rare one, * a brother of the famous 

 parson, I 'd lay a hundred to one.' And so he proved. 

 Here indeed was a study in heredity ! I positively 

 dreaded to meet him on the river. It was that un- 

 satisfactory week before alluded to, which ended up so 

 genially in the north-east wind and the thunderstorm ; 

 for abjure rivalry as you may, and as I always try to in 

 fishing, it is never pleasant to encounter success with 

 failure. Moreover, I met the keeper in due course, 

 and he instantly unbosomed himself on the subject, 

 namely that of the newcomer, the like of whom had 

 never been seen in his time on the river. His baskets 

 ran up in the neighbourhood of fifty fish, which was 

 certainly an unprecedented figure in modern times, 

 and there were plenty of experts here as on the Welsh 

 border. 



Now this is really curious and should give fishermen 

 something to think about, though on the lay reader 

 its significance must inevitably be lost. It is indeed 

 a matter of scientific interest that two brothers should 

 be thus miraculously endowed. There is no dry fly 

 subtlety in their case, no casting of phenomenally long 

 lines with a fly laid beautifully cocked at the end of 

 them, no persistent studies of nymphs and imagos and 

 cunning contrivance of imitations. In fact, I doubt 

 if any dry-fly fishermen stand out with such singular 

 consistency above their brother experts ! It is in this 

 case simply a question of thrashing up-stream with 

 practically the same flies as other men who have also 

 been at it all their lives. 



These occasional superfishermen, if the phrase be per- 

 238 



