SAD CONDITION OF THE CONWAY 149 



Mr. Ellis had lent me a light Leonard split cane 

 salmon rod, for which my line was a trifle too 

 heavy against such a gale. Mr. Jones was using 

 a stiff greenheart a grand rod made by Mr. 

 Whitty, of Liverpool, with which he got out 

 yards more line than I could manage, and it was 

 a pleasure to see Tom the keeper, who had been 

 up all the previous night catching poachers, 

 make the fly at the end of the line on it cut 

 through the air and go out straight as a die the 

 wind seemed to make very little difference to 

 him. 



THE SAD CONDITION OF THE CONWAY. 



Previous to last September it was more than 

 thirty years since I had seen the Conway, and I 

 have always had fixed on my mental vision, like 

 a photograph, some stretch of the river near Llan- 

 rwst, because it was alive with jumping salmon. 

 Many a time since then I have thought of those 

 fish, and many a time I have talked with friends 

 who fished the lovely river, and of late years, 

 although they still fished it, their reports were 

 ever and ever more disheartening. I made in- 

 quiries and looked about for myse when at 

 Bettws-y-Coed last September, and I am con- 

 vinced that the Conway as a salmon angling 

 river is suffering from a complication of diseases. 

 There is poaching, unquestionably; but prob- 

 ably not worse than has been the case for fifty 



