TROUT-FISHING IN SWEDISH LAPLAND. 77 



great violent stream bore us past terrifying swirls 

 of broken water and roaring, foaming cascades, while 

 Olaf grinned pleasantly, and, by a skilful manoeuvre, 

 and just in the nick of time, we always escaped them. 



Before we reached Bastusele there was one place 

 where the fishing was so good that I returned all 

 the way to it next day, but was not rewarded in a 

 manner equal to the expectations I had formed of 

 it. This place, which had seemed to me such a likely 

 haunt for the great trout, was a connecting current 

 between two large lakes, thirty yards apart ; but as 

 the country was more thickly populated than the 

 regions above, boats were continually passing. The 

 river, whose course I had hitherto followed for over 

 a hundred and fifty miles, from this point runs in an 

 almost uninterrupted course of rapids to the sea. 



At Bastusele the settlers fish for the enormous 

 trout, or Salmo ferox, which they call lax (which 

 means salmon in Norway), with line of the very 

 strongest, colossal rough salmon flies, and a peculiar 

 large spoon they obtain in Stockholm. These great 

 trout are constantly fished for all the summer at the 

 entrance to the rapids close to Bastusele, and are in 

 consequence very shy and wild. There is here quite 

 an extensive settlement. I tried my luck in the usual 

 style from a boat, and, of course, great things were 

 expected of me, and I was even accompanied across 

 the lake to the favourite spot by five large boats 

 filled with spectators. 



Olaf had told most exaggerated stories of the 



