ON THE GLOUCESTERSHIRE COLN 179 



a better basket if there had been fewer fish to take 

 alarm at my clumsy casting. As it was, my total of 

 trout killed that day was only three, five or six others 

 being returned as below three-quarters of a pound, 

 though up to the eleven-inch standard of the water. 



It is probably heretical to say so, but I will venture 

 the assertion that, when actually engaged on the serious 

 business of trout-fishing, a man has no eye for scenery 

 terrestrial scenery, at all events. Aquatic scenery, 

 the twining of bright green weeds, the golden gleam of 

 gravel, the olive background of rushes, the dark cool- 

 ness of the depths such things must necessarily 

 impress him, because they are part and parcel of his 

 sport. Even of all this he is, it is likely, not appre- 

 ciative then and there, so to speak. The moments of 

 spiritual uplifting over the beauties of river nature are 

 detached, not consecutive. One comes, perchance, as 

 one rises to survey the world after placing the first fat 

 fish on its bed of dry rushes in the creel ; a second as, 

 having given him another brace for company, one sits 

 down to enjoy the frugal but unhurried sandwich. In 

 like manner does the angler take cognizance of the 

 wider world that encloses him and his valley at in- 

 tervals, and when there is leisure from the stress of 

 trying to catch fish. 



So have I observed Bibury, at breakfast from the 

 dining-room window ; after tea from the little terrace ; 

 from the bridge when, the rain having lifted, I took a 

 Sunday evening stroll as far as the hatchery. Such 

 observation becomes a habit it might well become a 

 lifelong habit for than this Cotswold village " earth 

 has not anything to show more fair"; and there are 



