A MARCH SALMON 49 



on the down-grade. Then the string of lochs 

 and view of snow on the mountains, the larches, 

 birches and dark-looking heather near the line. 

 The brown, dead bracken, snow-laden. Then 

 Kingussie. Travellers to the North of Scotland 

 can be divided into those who know that by 

 giving notice at Euston you can get a good 

 breakfast-basket at Kingussie and those who 

 think that you must wait for the change at 

 Inverness. The former, at the summit of their 

 joyful realization that the morning of arrival 

 in Scotland in spring has really come, find 

 themselves confronting a basket containing a 

 really hot breakfast of bacon and eggs, hot 

 tea, scones, oatcake and marmalade, all wrapped 

 in clean paper, and all of the best. They have 

 time for a smoke, and then they change trains 

 leisurely at Inverness. The latter arrive there 

 in a hurry, scramble for a hasty hotel break- 

 fast, and then hasten to the platform for the 

 northern line, with just time to find a seat and 

 possibly none to get a newspaper. Not that 

 that matters much. Who could read one, 

 passing along that railway line up the north- 

 east coast ? There is one spot where the line 

 leaves the sea and you get a glorious glimpse 

 of salmon river, and then a view of a tree-clad 

 gorge, with glimpses of coffee-brown rushing 



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