ON LAKES 109 



the shore ; but that may be only because, time being 

 precious, I have usually sought sport where some 

 fish were known to be, instead of experimenting 

 where others might possibly be. A consideration 

 supporting the surmise that some salmon may be far 

 out while others are close in occasionally suggests 

 itself early in the period of the spring fishing. 

 Sometimes the lake is covered by sheets of ice, sheets 

 that were once a single sheet, separated by channels 

 of open water. It being impossible to fish through 

 the ice, any salmon that comes on does so, of course, 

 in one of the channels, which as often as not is a 

 good way from the shallows by the shore. As it is 

 probable that the fish prefer to lie where the water 

 is not ice-bound, this is not conclusive evidence as to 

 the locality of their haunts ; but it is worth men- 

 tioning. It shows that sometimes at least the fish 

 do lie in the deeps. 



Even if it were certain that they did not, we 

 should frequently err by fishing along the shores 

 exclusively. Casually looking at a lake, which is 

 almost geometrically perfect in superficies, and seems 

 to deepen from the shore outwards according to a 

 gradation roughly regular, we are apt to suppose 

 that it is symmetrical below. It is not. Its inner 

 configuration is not like that of a bowl. It is 

 irregular. If the water were miraculously removed, 

 it would be seen to be the configuration of hill 

 and dale, Here and there would be an extensive 

 plateau. There is one, for example, in the middle 

 of Loch Lubnaig. Thus, it is not only near the 



