THE WELSH BORDERLAND 



me to remain as long as I chose. * Give me your rod,' 

 said I in my abasement, ' just as it is.' And I took it, 

 salmon-flies, as they seemed to me, and all, and he 

 departed. I began rising and catching fish at once, and 

 soon had half a dozen nice ones like those in my friend's 

 basket, when they went off the feed altogether ; and 

 in due course I wended my way homeward, thinking 

 furiously, but to no good purpose, I need hardly add. 

 Talking of these big trout-flies, then at any rate in 

 vogue among Salopians, every one familiar with the 

 line from Shrewsbury to Church Stretton and Here- 

 ford must know the Condover brook, named after 

 the village and its famous Elizabethan mansion, so 

 recently passed out of the Cholmondeley family. 

 For its higher waters sport pleasantly among the 

 meadows for several miles between the stations of 

 Dorrington and Condover, where it turns an eastward 

 course towards the Severn. It is quite a noted little 

 trout stream, though from a train window even a 

 practised bush fisherman might be apt to wonder how 

 he could circumvent the alders which bristle so thick 

 along its narrow course. I have often been invited to 

 make the experiment by a friend in Shrewsbury who 

 had rights upon it and fished it regularly. But the 

 weather has always been prohibitive, for like the little 

 girl of the nursery rhyme the moods of the Condover 

 brook run to extremes, and when it is low it is very, 

 very low, and, in short, impossible. But my friend 

 used to show me the flies he used upon it, the very 

 flies, in fact, which ' must be used,' and that the trout 

 demanded should alone be offered. And these corre- 

 sponded precisely in size withthosethat ha d so staggered 

 i. 161 



