A BOOK OF FISHING STORIES 



range of appetite or delicacy of choice. Red hackle, silver 

 body, black or purple wing, all were more or less alike to these 

 voracious upland trout, provided the gut-cast was fairly fine 

 and the flies were presented in clean and lively fashion. Some- 

 times I had three trout on at a time, and I made it a point of 

 honour to net every trout myself. Have you ever tried, 

 gentle reader, to net three lively trout simultaneously hooked 

 on one three-fly cast, while you are wading in eighteen inches 

 of rocky-bottomed water, and with a short-handled net ? It 

 is quite amusing and requires some handiness and skill. The 

 tail-fly trout must first be netted, then the dropper, then the bob. 

 These particular trout of whom I write all ran from half a pound 

 in weight to one-third of a pound (good herring-size), and they 

 fought most lustily. So the day wore on. Now I would fish 

 a stretch of stream for two or three trout, and then, from some 

 rocky wind-swept pool, would extract a round dozen or more 

 while standing on one spot. 



My wrist came to work like a machine. Almost at every 

 cast, as the afternoon wore on and the trout were well on the 

 move, would come the rapid, vicious rise, a turn of the wrist, 

 a bending rod, a lively dashing to and fro, and a leaping from 

 the water of a gleaming yellow speckled nine inches of trout 

 fighting for its life, and then another seven ounces or so added 

 to Ole's burden of fish. We came home that night with a 

 bag of trout that ran into three figures in numbers, and two 

 big figures in pounds of weight. But what matter the actual 

 score and scale ? We had had a glorious day in the open air, 

 amid wild scenery, and face to face with Nature in its plea- 

 santest and most captivating mood. 



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