9 o FISHING FOR PLEASURE 



does the wind always keep persistently in that 

 cold quarter when I go a-fishing? What a yarn I 

 should have to spin if the wind would let me! 



Friday, June gth. This is our last day fine 

 and bright, wind north-east, and strong at that. 

 I started off full of hope as usual, and I met dis- 

 appointment on the way. May Fly is not yet 

 over, or has it not yet begun? I observe to-day 

 that whenever a stray one struggles up on the 

 water it is quickly taken down by a trout, and 

 yet it is in vain that one daintily puts one's fly 

 within the spreading rings that rise has made. 

 If the trout comes at you at all, he comes short; 

 the cunning old brown trout has far too keen a 

 perception of what is real and what is false. 

 Now a rainbow, had one been there, would soon 

 have fought himself into my basket. I had many 

 a rise, but I caught nothing. I worked my way 

 up to that grand pool where, on Wednesday, I 

 caught five and lost two rainbows. To-day it 

 was very exasperating, for although I am sure 

 there are still many big fish in that pool, they 

 were shy, and the small ones gave them no 

 chance. No sooner had my fly touched the 

 water than it was snapped up by one of these 

 little pests; I caught a dozen of them, one after 

 the other, and then I gave it up, for it is really 

 quite heartrending to get the hook out of the 

 gills, or sometimes the tongues, of these little 

 innocents; to do it without injuring them in 



