I2 4 DAYS AND NIGHTS OF SALMON FISHING 



water then be moss-stained, your gut may be very 

 faintly tinged of the same colour very faintly 

 indeed, as all dyes are overdone ; but if the river 

 be clear, do not on any account stain your casting 

 line at all. The sky may vary in colour every 

 minute : an attempt to match it, therefore, is out 

 of the question. You may easily satisfy yourself 

 of the superiority of white over dyed gut, in ordinary 

 cases, by remarking the appearance of both when 

 placed in a tumbler of pure water. 



Whatever you do, have nothing to say to multi- 

 plying reels : they are apt to betray you in the 

 hour of trial. 



My first discovery of their insufficiency for heavy 

 fish created some embarrassment at the time. I 

 had a pet multiplier, which ran beautifully, and 

 which I had long used for trout fishing. As it was 

 sufficiently large to contain a salmon line, I em- 

 ployed it for that purpose also, till it began to get 

 ricketty with the more heavy work. One day, the 

 water being fallen in, and the morning also being 

 sunny, so as to exclude the expectation of killing 

 a salmon, I put some trout tackle at the end of 

 my line, which was on the said reel, and began 

 trouting in Bolside-water. In the course of the 

 day a cloud passed before the sun ; and at the 

 same time, as is usually the case, a slight breeze 

 arose and ruffled the surface of the water. I hastened 

 to change my tackle, and substituted a small salmon 

 fly in place of the trout ones : small, because, as I 

 have said, the water was quite fallen in. Though 

 many years have passed over my head since that 



