NOVEMBER 271 



descent. Spreading wide, it roars and rushes down 

 along a rocky channel under the beetling Gateheugh 

 for half a mile. A stranger would pass by this reach 

 without suspicion that there was a yard of fishing water 

 in the whole of it. The boatman knows better. Row- 

 ing into mid-stream at the foot of Cromwell, he drops 

 overboard, and, wading up to his armpits, slowly 

 descends down the very centre of the rapids, guiding 

 the boat to which he clings, and directing the angler 

 where to cast into a pot here, an eddy there. 



The descent can only be accomplished in certain 

 states of the water ; but the salmon dearly love these 

 mysterious resting-places in the tumult, and rise very 

 freely. So sure as you hook one, there will be sport. 

 Most likely he will be swept out of the little refuge 

 whence he rose, and go careering down the torrent, 

 while the reel spins merrily. You realise then how 

 much the ' wildness ' of a fish depends on the strength 

 of the stream. In fact, if you hook a log in a Norway 

 river, it will run harder than any salmon, for the log 

 descends unresisting, whereas a salmon hates being 

 carried down, and keeps his head up stream. So 

 if anybody sneers in your hearing at Tweed salmon 

 for their tameness, ask him if he has ever passed down 

 the tossing Gateheugh with a tight line, and landed his 

 twenty-pounder among the rocks under the towering 

 Gled's Nest, where the jackdaws wheel and chatter. 



So much for the bright side of the subject : now for 

 the seamy one. 



The salmon-angling season ends on most Scottish 



