JULY 185 



sound of falling water from a hundred streams hurry- 

 ing to the sea. To-day the wood resounds with a 

 querulous cry ; an eaglet, which has just left the eyrie 

 on a crag among the birch-trees, yelps impatiently for 

 food, and presently one of his broad-winged parents 

 soars circling round the summit, a mere speck against 

 the azure. It stoops lower and lower, till, with a final 

 swoop, it alights near the nestling, and the cry is 

 stilled. As far, however, as I can make out through the 

 glass, the old eagle brought nothing but its own presence 

 to satisfy the impatience of its offspring. 



Now loch-fishing, to be practised in perfection, should 

 be done from the bank or by wading. The rush of the 

 good fish from the shallow to the deep water loses half 

 its hazard, and therefore half its excitement, when the 

 angler can follow it in a boat. I was resolved, there- 

 fore, to trust to my legs, and, in starting, alluded dis- 

 paragingly to ' any duffer ' who cared to fish from a 

 boat. But four miles on this blazing morning seemed 

 to carry one to a different standpoint. It is not re- 

 freshing to bury perspiring limbs in stuffy waders ; the 

 water rippled attractively against the side of the boat ; 

 suppose I were to try a drift first, and take to wading 

 later when I had got cool. 



There was very little wind : just a light draught from 

 the east down the glen ; enough, and no more, to turn 

 part of the dark mirror to frosted silver. Our first 

 drift took us from the boat-house to the point where 

 the river leaves the loch through a rocky gorge. 

 Nothing happened for the first half- hour; I was on 



