xviii INTRODUCTION. 



Nor, while Tweed, in the vicinity of Kelso, excels as 

 a salmon stream, is it less famed as affording, along 

 with its tributaries Teviot and Eden, the choicest of 

 sport to those preferring the humbler but not less 

 delightful branch of the art trout-fishing. There, at 

 all seasons, and in all varieties of ways, has the angler 

 an opportunity of showing his address ; he is not, as on 

 some of our northern rivers, liable to become surfeited 

 with an over-abundance of rapacious and unwary fish, 

 or tired with the uniformity in point of size and appear- 

 ance which these present to his eye ; on the contrary, 

 he has to deal, as befits him, face to face, with craft 

 and caprice, while there is this, moreover, to excite and 

 interest him in the pursuit, that there are ever and 

 anon hovering, within cast of his line, trout, which, on 

 being hooked, will not submit without a struggle, and 

 when captured, cannot fail to call up those feelings of 

 exultation which none but anglers comprehend. 



A ten years' residence on Tweedside, and in the 

 neighbourhood of the town alluded to, along with the 

 farther experience of two seasons on the banks of 

 salmon-streams in the North of Scotland, has naturally 

 enough, since the publication of my Scottish Angler, in 

 1835, contributed in a large measure to deepen my 

 acquaintance with the practice of the art. During the 

 whole of this period, I have pursued it with a measure 

 of enthusiasm little inferior to that which actuated my 

 boyish years ; and were I to relate instances in order to 

 prove my attachment to river-side recreations, I should 



