CHAPTER IV 



MOKE SALMON 



"The cry is still, They come." 



SHAKESPEARE, Macbeth. 



THIS year, at the beginning of July, the river 

 is again in highest flood as high, at least, as 

 in the flood of early June. It has been raining 

 hard for days ; but the flood, though helped by 

 the rain, is not so much due to it as to the 

 south wind which has melted the great re- 

 serves of snow. At Sande, ten miles up the 

 valley, the water is out on the meadows, and 

 the pools in the river are obliterated. Below, 

 it runs within its banks, " brimming and bright 

 and large"; the falls are foaming races of 

 white water, with never a trace of the black 

 rocks which usually emerge from the torrent. 

 For the last week or more salmon have been 

 very scarce. There has been a great run of 

 grilse, and if the water has been suitable for 

 them, it is difficult to understand why their 

 elders should have declined to face it. But 



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