SEA FLY-FISHING. 19 



and after twenty minutes' play succeeded in getting 

 him very near the boat ; hut he then made a dart 

 downwards, just as we thought he was going to give 

 up the fight, run out about 1 20 yards of line, and got 

 away. I felt certain that some part of the tackle had 

 broken ; but on examination, I discovered the hook to 

 be perfectly straightened. Soon afterwards I took 

 eight other fish, which were all small. There was one 

 other rod out, and two hand lines; the rod was baited 

 with a sand-eel, and the lines with heavy leads and 

 my flies, but none of them had a pull : this I attri- 

 buted to my snood or casting-line being of twisted gut 

 stained gray, whilst one of the hand lines had a coarse 

 hemp snood, and the other had harp-string gimp, and 

 the rod had on a sand-eel for bait. It was as bad a 

 day for this sport as could be ; the hills were white 

 with snow, and there was a cutting north-east wind. 

 The boatmen said that they scarcely ever recollected 

 an instance of fish taking any bait in such weather. 

 Later in the day, however, I caught ten other small 

 fish, and the harp-string gimp with the flies caught 

 eight fish, one of them weighing five pounds. The 

 hemp snood with the flies caught only one fish, and 



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