SEA FLY-FISHING. 21 



killed them all; the smallest weighed three and a half 

 pounds. I also caught two small cod with pollack-flies. 



As the weather now began to get rough and 

 stormy, I did not venture out again ; for the sea gets 

 up very quickly in those parts, and if it blows fresh 

 from the North, it is almost impossible to regain the 

 shore, should the tide be ebbing at the same time. 



When I hear of gentlemen fitting out their yachts 

 for Norway and Lapland, and even to as great a dis- 

 tance as Nova Scotia, for the purpose of salmon-fish- 

 ing, I cannot imagine why this part of Ireland has not 

 attracted their attention ; and can only account for it 

 by the fact of its being in a wild part of that country, 

 and very little visited or known. When I say wild, I 

 mean that it is situated in a part of Ireland which is 

 uncultivated, and consists principally of lakes, barren 

 heaths and magnificent mountains : for I found the 

 peasantry there, though very uncivilized, a particu- 

 larly civil and inoffensive race, and apparently totally 

 different from the rest of the Irish peasantry; they are 

 supposed to be of Spanish origin. 



Your snoods or casting-lines for fly-fishing for 

 pollack must be either twisted gut stained gray, or 

 twisted wire covered with paint of a leaden colour, 



