iS6 DAYS AND NIGHTS OF SALMON FISHING 



should you be in a boat, and he should shoot away 

 down the river, you must follow rapidly ; then, 

 when he again turns upwards, what a clever fellow 

 your fisherman must be, to stop a boat that has been 

 going down a rapid stream at the rate of eight miles 

 an hour, and bring it round all of a sudden in time 

 to keep company with the fish, who has taken an 

 upward direction ! And what a clever fellow a 

 piscator must be, if he can prevent twenty yards of 

 his line, or more, from hanging loose in the stream ! 

 These sort of things will happen, and they are 

 ticklish concerns. All I can do is to recommend 

 caution and patience ; and the better to encourage 

 you in the exercise of these virtues, I will recount 

 what happened to Duncan Grant in days of yore. 



" First, you must understand that what is called 

 ' preserving the river ' was formerly unknown, and 

 every one who chose to take a cast did so without 

 let or hindrance. 



" In pursuance of this custom, in the month of 

 July, some thirty years ago, one Duncan Grant, 

 a shoemaker by profession, who was more addicted 

 to fishing than to his craft, went up the way from 

 the village of Aberlour, in the north, to take a cast 

 in some of the pools above Elchies Water. He had 

 no great choice of tackle, as may be conceived ; 

 nothing, in fact, but what was useful, and scant 

 supply of that. 



" Duncan tried one or two pools without success, 

 till he arrived at a very deep and rapid stream, 

 facetiously termed ' the Mountebank ' : here he 

 paused, as if meditating whether he should throw 



