THE WELSH BORDERLAND 



abandoned mill, and in some broken water there at 

 once killed a half-pound trout. 



Moving up I soon found myself in the castle park, 

 and upon characteristic Teme water, ill adapted to 

 a bright August day thin shallows and long, glassy 

 pools, with no sign of a fish moving. I was a little 

 sad when, after an hour or two of bootless endeavour, 

 I sat down to eat my hostess's carefully made sand- 

 wiches on the bridge at the top of the park. I could 

 see nothing ahead of me, for the river came breaking 

 with refreshing energy out of a densely wooded 

 gorge just above. It was in the afternoon when I 

 actually got up into this tangle, that I began to under- 

 stand my entertainers' enthusiasm, and when I began 

 to catch fish I understood it still more. This is 

 assuredly a wonderful mile or so for a gentle purling, 

 rippling river like the Teme, and seems nothing less 

 than a freak of nature. For leaving the placid streams 

 and pools of Leintwardine the Teme has here to 

 force its way through a high limestone ridge, and is 

 transformed for the time into a Welsh mountain 

 river ; plunging over rocks, seething in dark pools, 

 spreading out again into wide but fishable shallows, 

 broken by long ledges into tempting eddies, or again 

 gliding swift and smooth under mossy cliffs. This 

 is in truth a place as meet for the artist's brush as for 

 the angler's fly. Trees of every variety planted a 

 century ago by the celebrated horticulturists who then 

 owned the soil, overhung the river and thickly draped 

 the steep sides of the glen. The August sunshine, too, 

 was sensibly tempered up here amid the shady foliage. 

 Cool draughts, laden betimes with spray, breathed 



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