THE WELSH BORDERLAND 



he will ascend the mountain streams of Wales and 

 thrust his ugly head up in clear rocky waters where 

 his presence is neither more nor less than an outrage. 

 He is an interesting and valuable personality sucking 

 in flies beneath a willow on the Thames or Ouse ; 

 but up in this country no one wants him a bit : he is 

 an abomination. 



The Onny is not rated in the same class as a trout 

 stream with the Teme or Lugg, nice little river 

 though it be, and withal pleasant to fish. The trout, 

 moreover, run small in the Plowden water, mainly 

 about four to the pound. I only remember once 

 catching them really on the rise, and that was my 

 very first day on the water, an April one, considerably 

 over twenty years ago. It would certainly not be 

 worth recalling, but for a rather curious incident 

 connected with it. I was staying with an old friend 

 in the neighbourhood, and I use the prefix advisedly, 

 seeing that he dates back to the juvenile pike adventure 

 of the first chapter in this very county of Salop. Two 

 tickets for the Plowden water had been given us, so 

 my friend's son, then aged about twenty, and I drove 

 over one morning to make use of them. I always 

 noticed in those days that Shropshire men, north of 

 Ludlow at any rate, used very large flies for their 

 generally rather small streams and their certainly not 

 large trout. My young friend, when we fixed up our 

 rods on the banks of the Onny, proved a true Salopian, 

 and attached to his cast two or three flies that, though 

 of serviceable dressing, seemed to me quite monstrous 

 in size. He was an excellent fisherman though, 

 having been bred up one, with every advantage. I 



157 



