PARR-TAIL CASTS. 



droughts, much later. May and June, however, I 

 esteem to be the best months for parr-tail fishing, 

 although what is termed the swallow-smolt a coarse, 

 over-grown species of the salmonida, arriving some- 

 times in Tweed at the weight of seven pounds, and 

 frequently caught with the bait in question above four, 

 is more on the move, during the first-mentioned month. 

 The parr-tail, I may remark, is often used as a com- 

 panion to the worm, and proves most killing in a similar 

 state of water, and the same sort of day. described in a 

 previous chapter, as suitable for the worm-fisher. Indeed, 

 one pursuing that branch of the sport, in rivers fre- 

 quented by large trout, ought always to have parr-tail 

 tackle along with him, and employ it also, on procuring 

 the requisite bait, in places adapted to its use. These, 

 he will find, seldom interfere with his worm-ground, 

 being rapid and broken water, often the central cur- 

 rent, sometimes, indeed, seething eddies and detached 

 strips of the river, whitened over with foam ; nor are 

 racing shallows, less than the breaks and necks of 

 streams, to be despised, glassy and exposed though 

 they be, for there large trout love, on suspended fin, to 

 sun themselves, and undetecting avoid all detection. 

 Such localities, too, as I have described, are, in the 

 size and state of river referred to, well adapted for the 

 spinning of the minnow. After a flood, however, in 

 discoloured water, this bait must be fished with among 

 casts of a different character. The trout, then, except 

 in the smaller description of rivers, descend to less 

 turbulent places of resort. They move off more into 

 the silent shallows, sometimes to the very foot of 

 streams, into diversions from the main current, not 

 unfrequently, into what, in the usual state of the river, 

 is smooth and seemingly motionless water. They are 



