244 SPORTING IN BOTH HEMISPHERES. 



quiet, unpretending little German inn, kept by the post- 

 master, Schweiss, but who, with all his apparent simplicity, per- 

 fectly understood the best mode of plucking an English tourist. 

 The river in the immediate vicinity is shallow and rapid, 

 with a few deep holes, some beautiful runs and falls, and 

 rather broad in many places, in fact, to all appearance, the 

 beau ideal of a trout-stream ; shelving, gravelly banks are of 

 continual occurrence, giving every facility for wading, when 

 necessary, and landing fish, and its course is chiefly through 

 verdant meadows, with high embankments on either side, to 

 prevent the spread of inundations. 



Good trout are met with now and then; I have caught 

 them up to three pounds weight ; but the most numerous 

 inhabitants of this water were grayling, which at certain 

 times I have taken in very large quantities. They do not 

 run large, seldom exceeding one pound and a half downwards, 

 but are very active, bright fish. The best fly for this river, 

 and for grayling, I have invariably found to be the red or 

 scarlet spinner, with gold twist, and the spider-fly, at nearly 

 all seasons, and varieties of the March-brown with grouse- 

 hackle as 1 a trout-fly. The best specimens of the latter fish T 

 have ever killed in this river has been whilst spinning with 

 an artificial minnow, and, strange to say (if in deep water) I 

 have also generally taken good perch at the same time. My 

 fishing ground, as I have before stated, extended from Hom- 

 berg to Oflenburg, but the central parts of it, between the 

 towns of Hausack, Haslack, and Biberach, were by far the 

 best. I have sometimes killed upwards of one hundred 

 trout and grayling in the course of a day's fishing. 



Should the angler be disposed during the season to change 

 his head-quarters to Baden-Baden, with all its luxuries and 

 accompanying temptations, he will find a fortnight's expedi- 

 tion up the Murgthal, or valley of the Murg, will well repay 

 the trouble and expense. The fish are generally larger than 



