170 THE DIVINING KOD 



about for a bit. By this time I was at the end of the 

 cast, suffering horribly from my tormentors the itch- 

 ing, pricking, and tickling being as near intolerable as 

 physical sensation may be. It was as near certainty as 

 anything in angling can be that if I fished the Craig 

 Stream over again I should get another fish or two, for 

 I had seen some moving. Could I face it ? I blush 

 retrospectively to state that I was not enough of a 

 pachyderm to do so. Below the teeming wood was the 

 open strath, where there could be more air and fewer 

 midges. There were some good casts there and in 

 short, I fled, leaving a moral certainty for what was 

 most uncertain. 



Fronte capillata, post est occasio calva. 



Here was I with occasio fortune's forelock well 

 within my grip, and I let it go, hounded off by swarms 

 of micro-organisms. No more occasio that day, 

 unless a brace of good sea- trout may be accounted 

 such. 



XXX 



In the first series of these Memories, after describing 

 The Divining what had come under my notice in the 

 Rod proceedings of a ' dowser ' or professional 

 water-finder, I summed up the agnostic impression 

 made on my mind thus: 'I don't believe in the 

 divining rod, but I don't deny that its virtues are 

 genuine ; and were I in straits to find Avater, I should 

 employ without hesitation a professional water-finder 



