4 HAPPY HUNTING-GROUNDS 



Here hourly through each day Miller, the skilful 

 boatman, rowed two, or sometimes three of the 

 party across and across the long stretch of water 

 between Dunkeld and the ferry below Delvine, the 

 fortunate " sitters " taking their turns to seize the 

 rods which hung over the stern when the scream of 

 the reel announced that a " fish " had taken the fly 

 or minnow. Perhaps a second salmon would be 

 hooked before the spare lines could be reeled in, and 

 then some moments of breathless excitement would 

 ensue before the rival anglers could be landed to play 

 their fish ; or sometimes a foul would free one or both 

 of the hooked salmon. Still many a big fish suc- 

 cumbed, and the fortunate captor would return radiant 

 to boast of his twenty-five pounder, oblivious of the 

 fact that the honour really rested with the boatman, 

 whose skilled and practised movements had hung the 

 lure in every nook and corner where a fish might be 

 expected to rise. If the party was large, and the 

 number of would-be fishermen excessive, one or more 

 would be seen dotting the banks, and exploring with 

 the fly the few pools which were fishable from the 

 shore, consoling themselves for their inferior prospect 

 of sport by the proud consciousness that the whole 

 merit of any capture would be their own. Or an 

 overflow party would visit the stretch by Burn Bend, 

 and, commandeering a boat, try their prentice hands 

 at harling for themselves, or try their luck from the 

 bank where a cast could be reached in that way. 

 My brother-in-law Henry, now Sir Henry Graham, 

 K.C.B., never harled when alone, and even when 

 fishing from the boat had it let down by a rope a 

 yard at a time, and explored the casts in that more 



