AN ALBANIAN TROUT-STREAM 179 



the cabin, I noticed a shoal of mullet playing 

 about amongst the odds and ends of ship- 

 refuse which remained floating alongside the 

 ship in those tideless waters, and those mullet 

 reminded me of a fly-rod lying behind the 

 boot-shelf on the bulkhead near the ceiling ; 

 it was the rod with which I had caught my 

 first trout, presented to me when I left England 

 by the old uncle who had given me the 

 opportunity which led to so many of the joys 

 of life. There was also an old fly-hook, with 

 leaves of flannel, much moth-eaten, and, in 

 parchment pockets, a good supply of small 

 flies tied on rather thick gut, as most trout- 

 flies were in those days ; in a pocket of the 

 cover were coloured silks wound on cards, wax, 

 and a few feathers. Some hold that no true 

 sportsman buys his flies, he ties them for him- 

 self. My uncle held that view, as he also did 

 the tradition that the shooting man should 

 always clean his own guns and load his own 

 cartridges ; but those were more leisurely days, 

 before we began to live working always up to 

 the collar. I am afraid that I was never a 

 true sportsman in the sense of preparing my 

 own tackle, knotting up my casts, or tying my 

 flies, but it is never too late to mend, and 

 perhaps, some day, the struggle for existence 



