THREE FISHERS, AND SOME BIG FISH 137 



private secretary, and was most popular in the House, 

 giving diligent and unwearied attention to his official 

 duties. It was in that capacity that I first met him ; 

 when he most courteously found me a seat in a very 

 crowded house, to hear my father speak in the Irish 

 Church debate. From his return to England until 

 his death he was a regular visitor to the Scotch 

 salmon rivers ; the Ness first, and afterwards the 

 Tweed also. 



An entry in his Diary for 1883 records that since 

 i860 he had caught with his own rod, in the two rivers, 

 3,795 fish. In the subsequent years, up to the date 

 of his death, he records further sport to the amount of 

 806 fish, making the astonishing total of 4,601. As 

 to the weight of those fish, it may suffice to give as an 

 example the year 1883, when the fish killed were 235, 

 and their weight was 2,708 lb. As a poetical friend 

 wrote of him, 'he weighed his fish by the ton.' His 

 best day on the Tweed I have already mentioned. 

 His best on the Ness was August 7, 1876, when he 

 records as follows : ' Began fishing at ten minutes to 

 nine. Killed 15 lb., 10 lb., 8^ lb., 7 lb., 7 lb., 10 lb. 

 9 lb., 1 1 lb., 9 lb., 6 lb., 1 1 lb., 9 lb., 9 lb., 10 lb., 9 lb., 

 8 lb,, lost two, and had ten rises. The first six fish I 

 killed in an hour and ten minutes. Water rather 

 falling— dark. High S.W. wind.' In 1885, which he 



