98 A WOKD OF ADVICE. 



I just glimpsed him about twenty yards above lunging 

 out of the river, lashing his huge tail, and towing my 

 tackle after him. Soon after this my line came up quite 

 easily, and upon examination I found it about fifteen yards 

 minus of its fair proportion. As for the salmon, I never 

 saw or heard of him again." 



Ay ! In Scotland this is what we call being drowned ; 

 meaning that the line is so, the action of the current and 

 weight of water forming it into an immense curve, from 

 which position it can with difficulty be extricated; but 

 when you next hook any thing resembling jormungandr, 

 you had better endeavour to take the management into 

 your own hands, and not suffer the snake or salmon, as 

 it may be, to manage 'you ; and if he runs out your line 

 with a rush down the stream, follow, wind up, and keep 

 above him : should he then attempt to cross, keep your 

 line as short as you can, hold your rod aloft, and give him 

 the butt. For if you once suffer him to cross to the op- 

 posite bank with so long a line as you appear to have had, 

 he will not become your property never shall you re- 

 joice over his tinselled sides as he lies glittering on the 

 pebbles. Some water-elf (for such, I am told, there are in 

 Norway) never fails to interpose a great stone or rock 

 between you and your fish ; you toddle up the river all 

 too late; and your tackle, assuming Hogarth's line of 

 beauty, bears against this obstruction ; the salmon pulling 

 on one side against the concealed rock, and you unwit- 

 tingly on the other ; so that, betwixt your united efforts, 

 a fracture must inevitably take place, were your line even 

 as strong as that used in trolling for the great water-bull 

 of yore, when they baited with a sheep's head, My advice 



