126 TISH AND FISHING IN SCOTLAND. 



accounts is not only useless, but calculated rather to unfit a man 

 for the exclusive affairs of " Indian" life at least; very likely ; 

 Europeans do not go to India to study and observe. Knowledge 

 may be power, but there is a power above it, money. What 

 says Horace ? " Get money ; honestly if you can : but be sure to 

 get it." The only real power on the earth is the bayonet, which 

 is commanded only by money. The less that is said about 

 moral force the better; the joke is stale and thoroughly 

 exposed. 



CHAPTEE VIII. 



THE TWEED. THE TALLA. LOCH SKENE. 







SOME good angling streams join Tweed from the south ; the 

 Talla, for example, which indeed forms one of its sources ; the 

 Ettrick and Yarrow, the Tiviot, the Till. I shall speak of these 

 pretty nearly in the order I have enumerated. Loch Skene 

 belongs, to be sure, to the waters that join the Sol way, and may 

 be reached as well from Moffat on the Annan as from the 

 Gordon Arms on Yarrow. Nevertheless, I shall describe it as I 

 first saw it when, ascending to the sources of the Talla. we boldly 

 climbed the lofty mountain range, whence Tweed, and Clyde, 

 and Annan take their origin. 



THE BIELD. 



The angler will find the Bield or Crook good stations for sport. 

 The Tweed is here, upon which he can always fall back. He is 

 within a short distance of the Talla, and by starting early, he 

 may reach Loch Skene, returning the same evening to the Bield ; 

 but he must take refreshments with him, be regardless of fatigue, 

 sure-footed, and speedy of foot. His lungs must be untouched. 

 Linger not on the way. But before I lead the angler to Loch 

 Skene by this route, or any other, let me say a few words about 

 Tweed and Talla. 



