78 In Pursuit of the Trout 



pick up a few beautiful troutlets, that rise 

 fearlessly to the fly, a march brown or 

 blue upright. My companions stride on far 

 ahead, leaving me a mile or so of river to 

 fish. But the rise is very slight ; for there 

 is no sign as yet of the natural fly on the 

 water, nor is the wind in the right quarter. 

 Nevertheless, left to myself, I find plenty of 

 solace. Passing an old disused copper-mine — 

 there are many hereabouts — I find the place 

 straightway a mine of memories. A solitary 

 shepherd's cottage stands on the hillside within 

 a stone's-throw, and here, years back, I re- 

 collect as if it were but yesterday asking for 

 a glass of milk. It was a blazing day in 

 August, and I had been fishing the Barle, 

 with a college friend, from its source to 

 Landacre. The time in those Oxford days 

 was very sunny, for the mists of disappoint- 

 ment and sorrow were as yet afar. Often 

 enough in the intervening years I have longed 

 to revisit Exmoor, and at length, my wish 

 fulfilled, find that the place has lost none of 

 its former fascination. The loneliness of its 



