NORTHUMBERLAND 



in two parallel valleys. The upper Wear, though 

 even in those days disfigured here and there with 

 mining villages and slightly tinged with lead hush, 

 was a broad and beautiful river, rocky, rapid, and begirt 

 with sylvan scenery. Some school friends of mine 

 lived on its banks, and were wonderfully handy and 

 knowing fishermen from boyhood onwards. They 

 made their own rods, tied their own flies, and through 

 the summer months always used horsehair. The 

 Wear trout ran small, about four to the pound, with 

 always better possibilities. But they were extremely 

 shy, and in the summer months at any rate, during 

 which my frequent and lengthy visits were generally 

 paid, took a lot of catching. The small local school of 

 fishermen to which my friends belonged were purists 

 in their own way of a type which, though differently 

 fashioned, could have almost given odds to the dry- 

 fly purists of to-day. A rod procured at a tackle 

 maker's was here anathema, and an object of scorn, 

 that of any London maker of repute being held in 

 especial contempt. And I am bound to say you could 

 not have purchased anywhere in those days rods of 

 such featherweight, balance, and driving-power all 

 combined as were made by these lads and their neigh- 

 bours. They were on the stiff side, and built to 

 spHce. Ferrules were regarded like anything else 

 that came from a manufacturer's as Cockney abomina- 

 tions. These Arcadians were, in fact, twenty years 

 ahead of their time ; that was about all. 



I can recall even at this hour the feel of those 

 home-made rods. You could purchase any amount of 

 similar weapons to-day, and of course infinitely smarter 



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