44 ONE SALMON : A NOVA SCOTIAN 



early morning with the dew still hanging heavy on the alder bushes, 

 and the long clear day ahead of us, to enjoy the fishing and the 

 resinous scents of the firs and the fragrance of the forest flowers. 

 Ah ! these long midday siestas on the mossy knoll which over- 

 looks the Still Pool, when we steeped ourselves in the dreamy peace 

 and glory of the June river, and recalled some of its many fishing 

 scenes of the past : the famous run down to the sea of that twenty- 

 pounder through half a dozen pools ; the saving of that other fish 

 by cutting the line after he had fouled a log, and tying line on another 

 rod ; the ludicrous escape of that one to whom, about to receive the 

 coup de grace from the killing stick, came liberty by an unlucky 

 blow which struck the guide's fingers and made him drop the still 

 very lively fish into the river. 



It is a Nova Scotian stream of which I am writing, and like many 

 others of that province it has its birthplace its cradle so to speak 

 in one of those numerous lake basins which are sprinkled over the 

 interior in countless number, and a short course of some twenty 

 miles to the Atlantic seaboard. The lower portion of the stream, 

 a strip of some three miles, . offers the best fishing, and only lately 

 seventeen fish have been hooked in one day in this stretch of water. 

 It affords a choice of some eleven good pools. In this part of the 

 fishing world one meets on almost every river an Admiral's pool, 

 a General's pool, a Priest's and a Doctor's. The titles are all 

 reminiscent of worthies not unforgotten among the angling frater- 

 nity ; ' good anglers now with God ' would have been Walton's com- 

 ment on all of them, had he known and loved them as many out here 

 have done ' men of mild, sweet and peaceable spirits such as most 

 anglers have'. Other resting stations of the salmon are the ' Pet 

 Pool ', where the river gathers its waters into an oily smoothness in a 

 narrow funnel before it plunges into a wild rapid, where many a 

 good fish severs his connexion with the rod ; the ' Hemlock Pool ', 

 where a large tree of that species deepens the darkness of the 

 already dark water with its feathery branches ; the ' Oak Pool ', 

 where, beneath deep shadows of leafage in the turf-cushioned arm- 

 chairs made by massive twisting roots, many an honest fisherman 

 has eaten his midday -sandwich and washed it down with a cool 

 draught from the adjacent 'whisky spring'; the 'Still Pool', 

 the cast of a fisherman, which must be made with the smallest of 

 flies, gently as an autumn leaf fluttered by a faint breeze on the 

 water, where a brown strip of submerged rock marks the chosen 

 ' seat ' of many a fine fish ; the ' Flat Rock ', and ' The Turn ', 

 and ' Fool's Pool ', and ' Rocky ', and ' The Meadow ', and the 

 ' Champagne ', with its creamy bubbling water ; and the ' Foot of the 

 Lake ', and ' Log Pool ', and ' The Dam ', Is not the reason for each 



