TROUT IN FLOODED STREAMS. 119 



of five or six hours. During this period, short intervals 

 of relaxation frequently occur, when the fish refuse to 

 feed, and as often there are climaxes when they seize 

 the worm with more than usual alacrity. These, how- 

 ever, happen chiefly on variable and unequal days, when 

 warm glimpses mingle with dull and cloudy weather. 



I proceed now to a description of those portions of 

 water where success is generally met with by the 

 worm-fisher ; and, be it noted, that such are not the 

 usual haunts of trout when in quest of insect and 

 surface food. They are, on the contrary, the very 

 places which an experienced fly-fisher would look over 

 and avoid. Instead of the central current or foaming 

 eddy, they consist of shallows, off-streams, and nooks 

 of water ; thin, fordable, gravelly stretches, and that 

 smooth but not tardy flow, which in large rivers fre- 

 quently heads a more troubled descent or rapid. 



I say not that the main stream is altogether to be 

 neglected, for, under long- continued droughts, it is 

 frequently, from the nature of the channel or alveus, 

 the only portion of water where fish can be taken ; but, 

 in the general experience of all able worm-fishers, the 

 largest and finest trout are found feeding among the 

 shoals and detached runlets, in places frequently, which, 

 at first glance, one is led to imagine are not of sufficient 

 depth to cover and conceal them. Here they lie in 

 watch for their expected prey, under the shelter some- 

 times of a large stone or jut of rock, and in its absence, 

 breasting immoveable the gliding current. 



In swollen waters, I need scarcely inform the angler, 

 that trout, during summer, take the worm eagerly at 

 what is termed the tail of a stream, in places that are 

 neither calm nor turbulent, small eddies, &c. Among 

 hill burns, no one can mistake where to drop his bait ; 



