WHITEADDER AND LAUDERDALE 



and least accessible portions of the Whiteadder and 

 its tributaries. A good deal of exaggeration, however, 

 is indulged in regarding this increase of fishermen. 

 Ten years before those here told of, that celebrated 

 Scottish angler Stewart, whose range included the 

 Whiteadder, wrote in his little classic that fishermen 

 had so multiplied, the future of sport on the Border 

 was most problematical. I think the fifties and sixties 

 did witness a very great impetus to fishing, helped 

 partly no doubt by railroad facilities. But at any rate 

 in the seventies all these open waters were full of fish. 

 As indicating the attitude then, and even still, of the 

 lowland angler, Stewart regarded open rivers as a 

 matter of course. I don't think he even discusses the 

 closing of waters in his remarks on the future of fishing. 

 That rivers could be depleted by fair fishing, which 

 here includes the worm, never, I think, entered his 

 head. Such a point of view rarely occurs to the 

 typical lowland angler even to-day, and I believe in 

 the main he is right. What change, if any, has taken 

 place in these streams since the ' good old days ' when 

 I fished them as a youth, I don't feel qualified to 

 say, interesting as such a comparison would and must 

 be to any one concerned with the welfare of trout. 

 But here is the local point of view, and apparently its 

 results illustrated. 



A few years ago, after some thirty-five of complete 

 absence from this Border country, I found myself 

 standing on a bridge over the Whiteadder in the 

 Berwickshire low country. It was, in fact, my first day 

 on Scottish soil and first sight of the Whiteadder since 

 youth. My host and companion was a local land- 

 Y 337 



