JUNE 137 



for, prevailed in all departments. Small lots of Duns 

 and cinnamon reds freely on offer met with a total 

 absence of demand. All stocks, however, firmly held 

 in expectation of a rise.' Now, inasmuch as the public 

 are invited to angle in Loch Leven on payment of a 

 substantial, though by no means exorbitant sum, they 

 are not fond of planking down their dollars (payment, 

 by the by, at Loch Leven is expected in the national 

 coinage of bawbees, though southern money will not 

 be refused) and going home with empty creels. So 

 recourse is had to natural and unnatural minnows 

 phantoms, pearlbacks, kill-devils, Devon spinners, and 

 other unhallowed contrivances, which are plied daily 

 from shore to shore. That Loch Leven is not utterly 

 ruined for sport, and continues to produce trout light- 

 hearted enough to rise at the fly in the face of such 

 disheartening treatment, shows how extraordinary are 

 its resources. 



The fact is, that a trout hooked on strong tackle, its 

 mouth crammed with several triangles, and with the 

 weight of forty yards of submerged line to contend 

 with, can offer no good fight. Sport degenerates into 

 the merest pot-hunting. 



LIU 



But there are exceptional lochs where the use of the 

 minnow is not only pardonable but commendable, inas- 

 much as it is the only way of catching trout 



, . , , -ui -U i Salmoferox 



which have become incorrigible cannibals, 



and highly exciting, by reason of the immense size to 



