4 86 itfnss of tbe 1Rofc, IRifle, ant) (Bun 



His wishes, his tastes, his skill, his character all helped 

 to make him what he was an angler ; and the bias that 

 found support in these presided over his lot, and led him 

 to choose for its conditions those that were most in its 

 favour. His happiness was to be near the two beloved 

 streams of Tweed and Teviot ; his glory was to know 

 them in every mood, to be familiar with their every 

 current and eddy and tributary, their sleepy willow- 

 shaded pools and glancing silvery reaches, their still 

 waters and noisy caulds, their swift red spates and 

 stagnant shallows, the birds that haunted their banks, 

 the very sedges and forget-me-nots that fringed their 

 margins. However far afield he went and at one time 

 and another he fished almost every river, loch, and burn 

 in Scotland he came back to his Tweedside home with 

 boundless content. The Tweed wa.s the best of rivers, 

 to his thinking, and next best was the Teviot, and he 

 did not care to stay long away from them. Only one 

 other river-valley vied in his regard with theirs the 

 Vale of Yarrow and its lochs. 



Besides these, other streams had their qualities, could 

 be fished for passing pleasure, could be critically discussed 

 and entered in his diary, could furnish adventures, and 

 even give good sport ; but their waters had no music in 

 their murmur, no thrill of countless recollections in their 

 rush. 



As his best hours were passed in their neighbourhood, 

 he seldom left it ; so that his life is that of a man who 

 stayed chiefly at home, and found all needful variety in 

 the gentle and unexciting changes which brighten home 

 and country life." 



