THE BLACKWATER 319 



THE BLACKWATER 



This stream ranks next to the Grimersta. A number of 

 lochs contribute to the Blackwater, but they are not arranged 

 in a chain, as in the Grimersta district. They feed two separate 

 streams which, on uniting some 6 miles from the sea, form 

 the Blackwater. In the days of " Sixty-One " this stream 

 went with Soval, and in his book, already referred to, he gives 

 an excellent account of the little river. 



" From the junction there are 2 or 3 miles of rough 

 water before you come to the first legitimate salmon pool. I 

 call it legitimate ; for, though I have done such a thing as catch 

 a fish in the rough water above this pool, yet, generally speak- 

 ing, fish don't stay in it, but run through for the two lochs. 

 From this legitimate pool to the Major's Pool, about a mile, 

 when there was plenty of water and you knew it well, the 

 fishing, to my mind, was always charming ; for the gentlemen 

 were very merry, and dodged about in the little narrows and 

 pools in a very artful way. . . . From this pool to the big 

 pool was about another mile and a half of charmingly varied 

 water pools, streams, and narrows ; but it required fishing, 

 though not long casting. . . . The big pool, and the stream 

 running into it, was the crack cast of the river ; but I confess 

 it was not my pet, for when in prime order it was necessary to 

 cast a long line in the teeth of the wind, or rather across the 

 wind, three-quarters against you, so that it was all but 

 impossible to prevent your line bellying ; and your fish rose 

 on a curved, not a straight, line, which is not as it should be. 

 . . . But what with the wind and the stream, when you 

 hooked a fish there he fought. Strange to say, though the 

 pool was alive with fish, and rising in all parts by the weeds, 

 you seldom took one anywhere but in the stream and its entrance 

 into the pool between the two high banks of sedges. If by 

 chance you ever did rise a fish in other parts, he generally beat 

 you and got off. 



" I put a boat on this big pool, and got very nearly drowned 

 two or three times, but never did anything to repay me for the 

 trouble. From the big pool there was about half a mile of 

 still, deep water, with little or no stream, but full of fish. When 

 the wind was right anything east, north, or south, each was 

 useless, as it was still water on all the good casts there were 



