AUSTRIA 41 



moderate rent. In Styria there are many remote spots where very 

 excellent fishing is to be had on such easy terms as I have described. 

 Thus in the shooting we rented in that picturesque country there 

 was a capital stream and a nice little lake, where my wife, who knows 

 of fishing but little more than I do, often caught twenty-five fine 

 trout, varying from 4 ozs. to i^ lbs., in a short afternoon, while good 

 fishermen more than doubled that bag; in the same time. Considerino- 

 that until the first year of our lease the previous owners (the abbot 

 and monks of the rich old monastery of Admont, who had possessed 

 it for just four centuries) obtained their large supply of trout for the 

 numerous fast days from this water, more than 3 cwt. being, I believe, 

 annually netted in the two principal pools on the river, it was 

 wonderful that the fishino; had not been ruined lono- aeo. The fish 

 seemed very unsophisticated, and almost any fly picked at random 

 from my book, stocked many years previously for Scotch waters, 

 seemed welcome, though I think on the whole the gaudy ones were 

 preferred ; and, certainly, the clearer the water and the brighter the 

 sun, the better did the fish bite in that particular locality. Sir Walter 

 Corbet and Sir Edmund Loder, both fishermen of experience, caught 

 fish exceeding 2 lbs., but neither succeeded in catching any of the 15-lb. 

 and 20-lb. monster lake trout which it was said inhabited the very 

 deep loch, at any rate in the imagination of the keepers, who stoutly 

 believed in the existence of these somewhat legendary giants. 



There was no regular fisherman on the place after the first year 

 of our lease, one of the keepers being called into requisition when 

 we went fishing. One day, Lady Loder and my wife fished down 

 the stream for some distance, the two husbands being in pursuit of 



