A PECK OF TROUBLES 235 



Some trout are much more prone to go to weed than 

 others. I remember getting several good trout of 

 about two pounds from the Avon one hot summer 

 when the weeds had not been cut for some time, 

 and each fish seemed to be in a little round hole 

 with a belt of thick herbage protecting him on every 

 side. It was most interesting and attractive fishing 

 because there was little or no fly, and hardly any 

 stream in the holes, and one had to stalk one's 

 quarry, lying near the surface probably from force 

 of habit, and drop a Wickham or a red quill as 

 close to its nose as possible. The trout took the 

 fly well enough, when one got the preliminaries right, 

 and the odd thing was that they made little or no 

 use of the weeds. I remember no interludes of 

 hand-lining. Casualties there were, certainly, but 

 mostly due to my custom, when possessed by panic, 

 of pulling a fly away from a fish or else of trying to 

 do so too late and leaving it in his mouth. Two- 

 pounders visible in small round holes usually give 

 me panic. 



As a contrast to this fishing I remember a day on 

 the Gloucestershire Coin when fish after fish ran 

 straight into the weeds on being hooked and mostly 

 remained there. Hand-lining, which is effective 

 in some cases, was useless there because as the weeds 

 were not very thick the fish improved them by 



