110 DATS AND NIGHTS OF SALMON FISHING. 



the hour of prime. I asked no questions, for I cannot 

 endure to hear beforehand what sort of sport I am 

 likely to have. Sober truth is sometimes exceedingly 

 distressing, and brings one's mind to a lull ; it puts an 

 end to the sublimity of extravagant speculation, which 

 I hold to be the chief duty of a sportsman. So, as I 

 said, I asked no questions ; but I saw the river Ettrick 

 before me taking her free course beneath the misty 

 hills, and brushing away the dew-drops with my steps, 

 I rushed impatiently through the broom and gorse 

 with torn hose and smarting legs, till I arrived at the 

 margin of that wild river, where the birch hung its 

 ringlets over the waters. 



Out came my trusty rod from a case of " filthy dow- 

 lass." Top- varnished it was, and the work of the famous 

 Higginbotham : not he the hero of a hundred engines, 

 "who was afeard of nothing, and whose fireman's 

 soul was all on fire ; " but Higginbotham of the Strand, 

 who was such an artist in the rod line as never appeared 

 before, or has ever been seen since. " He never joyed 

 since the price of hiccory tvood rose," and was soon 

 after gathered to the tomb of his fathers. I look upon 

 him and old Kirby, the quondam maker of hooks, to be 

 two of the greatest men the world ever saw, not even 

 excepting Eustace Ude, or Michael Angelo Bonarotti. 



But to business. The rod was hastily put together ; 

 a beautiful new azure line passed through the rings ; a 

 casting line, made like the waist of Prior's Emma, ap- 

 pended, with two trout flies attached to it of the manu- 

 facture even of me, Harry Otter. An eager throw to 

 beoin with: round came the flies intact. Three, four, five, 



