100 SEASON 1873-74. 



trays, and was much surprised one morning to find about half the 

 alevins had passed into the 9-feet pond. This was the more annoy- 

 ing, as I had intended to move the pond further down. However, 

 the stream at Middlethird could not be depended upon much 

 later, and I levelled a part of the bank just above the junction of 

 the Middlethird burn with the stream from the Grey Mare's Tail. 

 Across the latter I made a dam to raise the water, and left the 

 Middlethird burn to take away the waste. I then got as many 

 foresters as possible, and taking the end of the 9-feet pond myself, 

 carried it bodily, with its water and fish, for there was no way of 

 catching them out of the gravel without hurting them, out of the 

 wood and through the park for a distance of half a mile. Since 

 that day I have never put gravel into a box with young fry ; it is 

 so easy to pour them out if the bottom of the box is clean, and no 

 danger of harming a single alevin. 



I then placed the 9-feet pond on the place I had levelled, and 

 fed the water from the dam through a V-spout, the front of which 

 was protected by fir branches, to prevent leaves or debris stopping 

 the mouth of the spout. The old course of the Grey Mare's Tail 

 stream I left free to take the overflow of the dam, and I thought 

 things were safe. But I was mistaken. Below the dam the Loch 

 Coulter burn passes under a bridge in Stockbridge wood, and imme- 

 diately above the bridge the Grey Mare's Tail stream, reinforced 

 by the Middlethird burn, joins it. With the first big spate, this 

 bridge dammed the water back to the foot of the dam, and 

 reached the 9-feet pond. At first there did not seem much 

 danger, but by four in the afternoon the flood stood level with the 

 top of the dam, and the 9-feet pond began to float down stream ; 

 the head keeper had come to my assistance, and we both were in 

 the water up to our waists trying to fasten ropes to the pond, 

 when the keeper lost his footing, and in trying to save himself, as 

 he could not swim, upset the 9-feet pond. The lids being of wire- 

 netting, of course most of the Swiss trout escaped, but some were 

 found in the pond when it righted ; luckily it had not turned 

 over, and we got it securely tied, and, after the water fell a 

 little, replaced. After this loss I surveyed all the district round 



