142 FISHING IN EDEN 



boy, and give him the sense of " rod touch," perhaps 

 no better way could be devised than by putting him 

 among the smolts on a midsummer evening. " Bob '' 

 always said that the delicate art of striking must 

 come through having something to strike at. 



When the hazel nuts are full, and the old women 

 are gathering bramble berries in September, the 

 trout are once more on the day-time feed. There 

 is then, for a few weeks, a return on their part to 

 spring ways both in regard to habitat and food. 



September day-time fishing can be practised in 

 the gently flowing flats, at the tails and heads of 

 streams, and in the pools of the fell becks. Spring 

 flies here come into service again. 



Every little autumn flood beckons its quota of 

 trout up to the old nurseries in the becks. Here the 

 spawning grounds lie far away from the big river. 

 I always think of these becks, when the bracken is 

 turning yellow on their banks, as the safe refuge of 

 motherhood. So far they are unpolluted. No 

 chemical factories poison their waters. Innocent, 

 old-world corn-mills still grind there as of yore. 

 Rudyard Kipling calls attention to them in his 

 inimitable way : 



" See you the little mill that clacks, 



So busy by the brook? 

 She has ground her corn and paid her tax 

 Ever since Domesday Book." 



