244 A 64-POUND SALMON 



struggle, I had him beautifully gaffed, and lying on 

 the bank. 



He took forty-five minutes to kill, and out of that 

 time he sulked for fifteen minutes among some dan- 

 gerous rocks in a deep run, about 70 yards from the 

 bank on which we finally landed him. I also killed 

 two fish over 30 pounds with the fly (Jock Scott and 

 Popham), besides losing another very big one, and 

 finished off the day by killing a 22-pound clean-run 

 salmon with many sea-lice on him. It was a coinci- 

 dence that the late Mr. Merthyr Guest, M.F.H., should 

 have killed in the same pool on July 20, 1894, a 64- 

 pound salmon, the length of which was 4 feet 3^ inches, 

 but with all other measurements similar to the one 

 just described. Mr. Guest's fish was almost the biggest 

 salmon killed on a rod at that time. I killed on this 

 water on September 10, 1896, a clean -run salmon of 

 24 pounds. This will serve to show that a river has 

 every chance of giving good sport until the close of 

 the season, provided always that the rain is forth- 

 coming, or that there is sufficient water in the river 

 to bring the fish up. Our party had been waiting for 

 rain for over three weeks, and we had been amusing 

 ourselves in almost any way but salmon fishing. 

 August is as likely to be a wet month in the North of 

 Norway as it is to be a dry one, and the salmon con- 

 tinue to ascend the river until the close of the season 

 (September 14). From the drawing I made and the 

 measurements taken of the salmon, the model shown 

 in Plate XL. has been made. The mouth, which is 



