LOCH AWE 41 



capital company. All this is pleasant, but all this 

 attracts multitudes of anglers, and it is not in 

 nature that sport should be what it once was. Of 

 the famous salmo ferox I cannot speak from 

 experience. The huge courageous fish is still at 

 home in Loch Awe, but now he sees a hundred 

 baits, natural and artificial, where he saw one in 

 Mr. Colquhoun's time. The truly contemplative 

 man may still sit in the stern of the boat, with 

 two rods out, and possess his soul in patience, as if 

 he were fishing for tarpon in Florida. I wish him 

 luck, but the diversion is little to my mind. Ex- 

 cept in playing the fish, if he comes, all the skill 

 is in the boatmen, who know where to row, at 

 what pace, and in what depth of water. As to the 

 chances of salmon again, they are perhaps less 

 rare, but they are not very frequent. The fish 

 does not seem to take freely in the loch, and on 

 his way from the Awe to the Orchy. As to the 

 trout-fishing, it is very bad in the months when 

 most men take their holidays, August and Sept- 

 ember. From the middle of April to the middle 

 of June is apparently the best time. The loch is 



