EFFECTS OF MUCH FISHING. 29 



they will bear comparison with any of the other 

 tributaries of Tweed open to the public. We once 

 took with the minnow, between Eowland and Stow, 

 twenty trout, the whole we got that day, which 

 weighed fifteen pounds, and we never got such a 

 large average size of trout in any of the other tribu- 

 taries of the Tweed, or even in Tweed itself. 



There are not by any means too many anglers ; 

 on the contrary, our Scottish waters would accom- 

 modate, if properly distributed, twenty times as many 

 as there now are. Tweed and its tributaries alone 

 would, giving each plenty of water to himself, accom- 

 modate several thousands every day during the 

 season. 



Much fishing, besides to a certain extent thinning 

 the trout, operates against the angler's killing large 

 takes by making the remaining trout more wary ; and 

 it is more from this cause than from the scarcity of 

 trout, that so many anglers return unsuccessful from 

 much-fished streams. The waters also now remain 

 brown-coloured for such a short time that the modern 

 angler is deprived, unless on rare occasions, of even 

 this aid to his art of deception ; and the clearness of 

 the water and the increased wariness of the trout are 

 the main causes why the tackle of fifty years ago 

 would be found so faulty now. Fifty years ago it 

 was an easy thing to fill a basket with trout, not so 

 now ; then there were ten trout for one there is now 

 the colour of the water favoured the angler, and 

 the trout were comparatively unsophisticated ; now 



