OCTOBER 257 



' Come on ! ' it seems to say to that fine fellow who 

 has just glided up, head and tail, as stiff as a board in 

 mid-current ; ' come on ! here is something he wants 

 you to believe is dainty fare. Don't you believe a 

 word of it: it is not a fly, or a shrimp, or a fish, or 

 anything good to eat at all; but just a bundle of fur 

 and feather, with a well-tempered double hook, and 

 here am I behind it to drag you ashore, if you are 

 such a fool as to bite at it.' 



Cast I never so delicately, the same explicit warning 

 is repeated again and again, with the effect that, 

 although the ' Sir Richard,' which I have substituted 

 for dainty ' Kate,' probably floats over the heads of 

 half a hundred fish, they only wink at it (or would 

 wink if they had the eyelids to wink withal), and 

 lie low. 



There is not an hour of daylight left, just time for 

 another trial of the rippling Kirkend. Fishing down 

 the Scottish side, I hold a fish for a moment or two, 

 and he is off. Over to England again ; perhaps the 

 gloaming has brought some of the fish out of the 

 kitchen into the brisker water. Ha ! there he is, sure 

 enough ; marry ! the heaviest fish I have felt to-day. 

 He runs strong and deep, perhaps it is that forty- 

 pounder which I have been toiling after for nearly 

 as many years. It is almost dark when the question 

 is decided, and it is a little disappointing to find he 

 is only another twenty-pounder. Had I lost him, 

 he would have figured in this chronicle of far more 

 formidable weight. 



R 



