140 FISH AKD FISHIXG LIST SCOTLAND. 



the minute it cornes from the river. I do not advise it ; it has 

 a peculiar odour and flavour. Life is riot altogether extinct 

 when placed in the kettle, and it tells on the fish when cooked. 

 I should not think it quite wholesome. Beef may be eaten when 

 the ox has been just killed, and it will be found quite tender, 

 but it is not wholesome. The stiffening of the muscles, which 

 always sooner or later follows the extinction of life, should be 

 permitted to take place, and to go off, before the flesh is fit for 

 use. Crimping qf fish is supposed to hasten the process, by more 

 speedily exhausting the life which remains in the muscles after 

 the death of the animal. 



Leaving Kelso, then, to wander down Tweed, the angler need 

 not be told how to proceed. The river is generally open for the 

 mere trout fisher, or the way may be smoothed by means of a 

 trifle. But it becomes broader and deeper as you proceed by 

 Coldstream and Norham, rendering deep wading more and 

 more necessary, more and more dangerous. The double-handed 

 rod must now be used even for trout, and these trout, as an 

 article of food, are scarcely worth eating. 



But the angler does not heed this ; his aim is health, solitude, 

 and the contemplation of Nature. From this he draws fresh 

 ideas, pleasing recollections, not the less, perhaps, that a slight 

 melancholy may give to them a tinge of yellow sere, which, 

 spreading all around, reminds him that winter hideous, aged, 

 wrinkled winter is about once more to strip the forest of its leaves, 

 the fields of their verdant tinge, the stream of its silvery trans- 

 lucent hue, sparing nothing, blacking the field, the mountain ; 

 the forest trees, which erst were beautiful, most beautiful, warm, 

 young, vigorous, have now settled down, withered by Time's 

 relentless hand into emblems of soul-despairing decay and frigid 

 death. 



With a sigh and lingering look, the angler quits the river side, 

 repairing once more to the busy haunts of men, to return, let us 

 hope, next year to his favourite pursuits, when the leaves are on 

 the trees, and the lambs in the fields. 



And now reader, gentle reader, farewell ; for if a true angler, 

 you are sure to be gentle. We may meet on Yarrow, by .the Loch 

 of the Lows, or on Ettrick ; it may be on Tweedside or by St. 



