TROUT AND TROUTING IN SPAIN. 



179 



Santander (Provincia). 



The Province of Santander, 

 hardly less wild and moun- 

 tainous than the Asturias, pre- 

 sents somewhat similar condi- 

 tions of water, fish, and sport. 

 The Cantabrian range, extend- 

 ing from Pyrenees to Atlantic, 

 the common southern boundary 

 of all the Biscayan provinces, 

 attains in Santander some of its 

 greatest elevations, including 

 the celebrated Picos de Europa 

 (9,000 feet), the home of the 

 Spanish bear and chamois. The trend of the land dips 

 gradually from these inland heights towards the sea : yet 

 even on the coast the scenery is savage and grand, some 

 of the altitudes being very great. The view looking 

 across the magnificent harbour of Santander recalls in the 

 " Sunny South " the scenery of Arctic Norwaj^ with all 

 the fantastic tracery of snow-mountains and jagged peaks 

 vividly reflected in the unruffled breadths of the fjord. 



The rivers, of course, reflect the characteristics of the 

 land. Born of the mountain and the snow-field, they 

 come leaping and surging seawards, dancing to their own 

 wild music, as they crush through narrow gorges, by crag 

 and hanging wood, hurrying ever northward towards the 

 Biscayan sea. The angler's path along their banks is no 

 made road : often for miles, ay, leagues, he may be con- 

 strained to follow the goatherds' upland path — a camino 

 de 'peydices in native phrase — and only able to gaze down, 

 like Tantalus, on tempting streams, perhaps close beneath, 

 yet far beyond his reach. 



Here, as elsewhere, success, we found, was not to be had 

 for the wooing, nor at the first time of asking. Eivers 

 that offered fair promise — beautiful waters, such as Besaya 

 and Saja, embedded amidst ilex and chestnut, where moss- 



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