80 SALMON FISHING 



running water itself can be made to appear uncannily 

 solid to the eye of a salmon, is it not conceivable 

 that the real solidity of gut may sometimes be 

 viewed with misgiving? The gut must seem a 

 monstrous horn. Who is to devise the invisible 

 cord ? 



The habits of trout and the state of the atmo- 

 sphere are in well-defined relations, which I have 

 endeavoured to state and to explain in Trout 

 Fishwig; but in relation to the weather, as in 

 regard to flies, the moods of the salmon are in great 

 measure a mystery. Going out of a morning, the 

 wisest fisherman cannot have more than a surmise 

 about what the day will bring forth. There is no 

 sign or symptom of the weather that is also a sign 

 as to the humour of the salmon. The temperature 

 is significant in one respect, upon which I will touch 

 by-and-by ; but otherwise, as regards fly-fishing, no 

 guidance is to be gleaned from barometer, thermo- 

 meter, weather - cock, or wind-gauge. Sometimes 

 there will be sport even when the exhausted atmo- 

 sphere awaits the restorative touch of lightning; 

 sometimes, in that state of weather, there will be 

 none. We can never tell. Trout keep down in 

 sultry weather, in which char often rise; but 

 salmon do not then or at any other time either rise 

 or sulk as a matter of course. The conditions by 

 which their habits are governed seem to be within 

 themselves, or within the water, exclusively. It is 

 well to remember, of course, that on most of our 

 rivers salmon are not much sought in summer. 



