A BOOK OF FISHING STORIES 



dusty streets distinctly unpleasant, raised a thirst difficult, 

 though not altogether impossible, to quench, and by contrast 

 brought to my mind longing thoughts of the purple heather 

 and rippling burns of my native land, some 4000 miles away, 

 where grouse were falling, and trout were being captured 

 by my more fortunate countrymen, while I was transacting 

 business and drinking lager beer in the State of Minnesota, 

 with the thermometer 95 degrees in the shade. 



I was lunching that day with one of my business friends. 

 Our American cousins are the most hospitable of mankind. 

 The conversation turned on fishing. With insular prejudice, 

 I openly and most unfavourably contrasted the muddy Missis- 

 sippi and its catfish and " suckers " with the salmon and 

 trout-stocked waters of bonnie Scotland. " Would you like 

 to catch some rainbow-trout } " said my host. " Where are 

 they ? " I doubtingly asked. " Thirty miles away I can show 

 you plenty," he answered. I had three days to spare, and the 

 matter was at once arranged. My incredulity as to the 

 existence of the trout, or indeed of fishable water anywhere 

 within reasonable distance in which to catch them, was, I trust, 

 more or less successfully concealed. The country was dried 

 up with drought. It had not rained for two months, and at 

 that moment extensive forest fires were raging in the northern 

 part of the State. 



The next afternoon, in company with two grain-men, a 

 learned judge, and a doctor, we started on our fishing picnic, 

 thirty miles by rail and four by road. In the evening we 

 found ourselves at our destination, a temperance country 



no 



