244 DAYS AND NIGHTS OF SALMON FISHING 



Clean fish are sometimes taken in this manner, 

 and most fishermen are provided with the tackle. 

 In a very low water in the summer, when fly-fishing 

 might have been said to be over, I once hooked a 

 good salmon in the Quarry stream above Melrose 

 Bridge. As a fish was at that time a great rarity, I 

 was particularly cautious in leading him ; never- 

 theless, with all my care, the hook, not having a 

 firm hold, came away from him after I had played 

 him a considerable time. 



Purdie saw him lying in rather an exhausted state 

 in the same stream, which was shallow, and, without 

 saying any thing to me, to my great surprise, seized 

 hold of my casting line and broke off the lower end 

 of it ; opened my book ; took a pair of rake-hooks 

 from it ; tied them on to the line, and, at the second 

 throw, tucked them into the salmon ; put the rod 

 into my hands, and I killed the fish after all. 



All this to the Southern ear sounds like poaching 

 of the most flagitious description ; but a salmon is a 

 fish of passage, and if you do not get him to-day he 

 will be gone to-morrow. The Tweed used to let for 

 above 12,000 a year ; judge, then, in what a whole- 

 sale manner these fish are caught by long nets and 

 other sweeping modes ; yet in what profusion they 

 continue to be found ! You may just as well think 

 of preserving herrings or mackerel as these delicious 

 creatures ; and there would be no objection to your 

 taking 3378 salmon at one haul, if fortune would so 

 favour you, as Commander Ross did at Boothia 

 Felix on the 26th of July, 1831. 



Keep Close time strictly ; kill no spawning fish ; 



