Sobn lounger 385 



St. Boswell's shoemaker had a standing invitation to 

 come and try a cast whenever and as often as he 

 pleased, an invitation of which he freely availed 

 himself. 



John had his own opinions on fishing as on politics 

 and religion opinions which were the outcome of his 

 own observation and experience. Some of these were 

 certainly eccentric. He was convinced, for example, 

 that the natural prototype of the salmon-fly is the 

 shrimp, and believed that the salmon, accustomed to 

 feed on shrimps during his residence in the sea, imagines 

 the fly yellow, black, brown, dun, it matters not what 

 the colour to be the shrimp. He got the idea from 

 the Rev. Henry Newland's delightful book " The Erne : 

 its Legends and Fly-fishing," where the author says of 

 the salmon-fly : 



" It is not like anything in heaven or earth, but it is very 

 like something in the water : it is like a shrimp, which I 

 imagine to be the food of the salmon when at sea ; he 

 comes into the river, is uncommonly at a loss for his 

 usual dinner, when he sees a little dancing fellow with 

 all these sharp-pointed wings, as we are pleased to call 

 them, jumping about in the running water, and he thinks, 

 of course, it is one of his old friends." 



But John Younger went further than this and made 

 the astounding assertion that it was the colour as well as 

 the shape and movement that beguiled the salmon, for, 

 says he, " shrimps are as varied in their colours as are a 

 flock of fancy pigeons ! " Had John ever seen a shrimp 

 in its native state ? I trow not. He was thinking, no 

 doubt, of boiled shrimps, as Victor Hugo was of boiled 



VOL. II. 4 



