140 A SALMON SNARED. 



Robin ? " said the Laird. " Deed, sir, I dinna ken," 

 said Robin ; " for sometimes they will tak' the thoom 

 o' yere mitten, if ye would throw it in, and at ithers 

 they wad na look at the Lady o' Makerstoun and a' her 

 braws." 



Salmon never take well when the weather is about to 

 change ; it is therefore useless to go out when the mer- 

 cury remains at this point. When it first sets in for a 

 continuance of dry weather the fish will rise about your 

 hook, and only break the surface of the water ; but 

 before a flood they will spring clean out of it, for 

 the purpose, perhaps, of filling their air-bladder before 

 travelling. 



These sportive fellows, however, sometimes get into 

 a scrape by being hooked outside. A salmon of ten pounds 

 was caught in the Skurry-wheel, at Sprouston, in the 

 following curious manner. The fish were rising wantonly, 

 but not taking the fly ; in striking at one of them the line 

 looped over its tail, and the hook catching the line on 

 the upper side the fish was fairly snared, and at length 

 killed, after showing extraordinary sport. 



Sometimes, also, they will leap out for pastime, and at 

 others from fear. Thus if a salmon has been once touched 

 sharply with the hook, when he sees the fly above him 

 on some future day he will often vault into the air. I 

 once saw a marked instance of this. 



A very young friend who was fishing with me saw 

 a fish spring over his line in this manner, and he kept 

 flinging at him with the same result, the salmon always 

 moving forward, till he fairly chased him up the water 

 some hundred yards ; that is to say, from " The Webbs," 



