SOME FISHING RECORDS 127 



description of Canadian fishing to an account of sport 

 in the neighbouring Metapedia river by Sir Henry 

 Stafford Northcote in 'Blackwood's Magazine' for 

 1877, and reprinted in the first volume of their series 

 entitled 'Travel, Adventure, and Sport.' From this 

 it will be seen that fifteen years have not materially 

 altered the method of fishing, and that the most 

 serious drawback to the sport then, as now, consisted 

 of the various flies and mosquitoes which take a 

 fiendish delight in penetrating an unacclimatised 

 skin. 



Mr. Arthur Fowler, who has fished in Canada as 

 in most other parts of the world, assures me that 

 Lord Kilcoursie has not in the least exaggerated the 

 marvellous dexterity displayed by the Indians in the 

 use of the gaff. It would appear that this is an 

 attribute of semi-civilised races, for he adds that the 

 only attendants whom he has known to compare 

 favourably with the Indians in this respect were the 

 Lapps on the Tana River, which he visited in 1896. 

 A greater contrast than this river presents to the 

 beautiful stream just described, rushing between 

 virgin forests, can hardly be imagined. There is no 

 scenery ; the river is from three hundred yards to half 

 a mile wide, and scrub birch is the only tree. For 

 thirty miles the land is sand and mud, not a stone in 



