ON SEA TROUT 



ranges in weight from one pound up to five pounds as a rule, 

 and may grow exceptionally to much larger weights ; and 

 there is a smaller fish, which enters the rivers rather later in 

 vast quantities. This latter ranges in weight from four ounces 

 to any size up to one pound. It goes by various names on 

 different rivers, but is commonly supposed to be the grilse 

 of Salmo trutta, and both in its appearance and in its rash, 

 unwary nature, it has all the characteristics of being a young 

 fish, which is mature in neither mind nor body. In most 

 rivers, however, these fish of the smaller class seem to out- 

 number the mature sea trout of all ages, which is not the case, 

 taking all the season through, as between grilse and salmon. 



Sometimes I think that sea trout fishing is the best of all 

 sport. It combines all the wildness of salmon fishing with 

 the independence of trout fishing, and one may have all the 

 excitement of hooking large fish without using a heavy rod 

 and heavy tackle. There is less rule and less formality about 

 it than there is about salmon fishing, and there seems more 

 scope for the individuality of the angler. Perhaps this is 

 partly because the sea trout season comes so directly after a 

 long period of work in the stale air of cities, and coincides with 

 the first burst into freedom and fresh atmosphere. The dif- 

 ference is so great in August, after a few days of exercise in the 

 air of the North, that there come times when the angler, who 

 wanders alone after sea trout down glens and over moors, has 

 a sense of physical energy and strength beyond all his ex- 

 perience in ordinary life. Often after walking a mile or two 

 on the way to the river, at a brisk pace, there comes upon one 



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