SEA-TROUT IN THE SHETLANDS 129 



teal and magenta, grouse and orange, and Zulu 

 were in the greatest request. The next formal- 

 ity was the engagement of a gillie, an essential 

 luxury, if not for any other reason than because 

 without one it would be impossible to find 

 one's way to the different beats, or to fish 

 them if we did, as it was all boat-fishing, either 

 in the deep voes or in freshwater lochs, of 

 which the sides were unsuitable for wading. 

 And now, at last, for the great experience of 

 that holiday. 



We started soon after breakfast for a tramp 

 across heather to one of the nearest of the 

 voes. They seem more like inland lochs than 

 arms of the sea, winding, as they do, for 

 many miles inland between heather-clad hills. 

 The sea-trout in them take, if they take at 

 all, fairly close to where small streams come 

 down to the sea from the freshwater locks. 

 These little streams meandering through the 

 peat-beds can barely be described by the 

 name of burns ; they are better described as 

 ditches. The voes were generally ruffled by 

 a breeze, and we fished the shallower voes 

 as one fishes a loch, pulling up to windward 

 and drifting broadside on, if there were two 

 rods in the boat ; stern foremost, so as to be 

 able to hold the boat against the wind, if there 



9 



