WESTERN WATERS 141 



and higher as I get nearer and nearer to the 

 water-side. 



Hood's immortal footman, after his ascent of 

 Mont Blanc, is anxious to describe the glacier, 

 which he does as follows : " Arter sliping and 

 sliding for 'ours, we come to the fust principle 

 glazier. To give a correct noshun, let any won 

 suppose a man in fustions, with a fraim and 

 glass and puttey, and a dimond pensel, and it's 

 quit the revers of that ! " In like manner I 

 must ask any one to disabuse himself of all pre- 

 conceived notions of a salmon river, whether 

 derived from books or experience, in order that 

 he may understand the one I am about to visit. 

 Imagine a noble stream, now pouring down in 

 cataracts, now breaking white in rapids, and now 

 rushing black, deep, and oily around boulders 

 at the foot of a fall and it is quite the reverse 

 of that. At the upper part of its short course 

 near its source it is, indeed, wild and rapid 

 enough, but there it is little fished ; from thence 

 it gradually winds through an almost level plain ; 

 rock and gravel becoming rarer and rarer, the 

 stream deader and duller, and its bends more and 

 more circular as it approaches the sea. Looking 

 down upon its course from the hill, it is not diffi- 

 cult to see what geology and history confirm ; that 

 the great peat moss through which it flows must 

 at no very distant date, geologically speaking, 

 have formed a part of the sea itself, and that 



