From Fox's Earth 



Every borderer is an angler, which is quite 

 another thing from being able to handle a rod. 

 Every ghillie can handle a rod on an off day, which 

 is quite another thing from being an angler. On 

 the border, angling is a tradition with its wealth 

 of story. In the Highlands it is bald and raw. 

 No words will make this quite plain. To learn 

 the difference one must see the borderer at the 

 streamside, and know something of his relation 

 with his rod. An atmosphere will be seen to 

 lie around him. The rod is his companion, 

 not his plaything. Many memories have they 

 in common, which betimes they interchange. It 

 is a business in the north; it is passion in the 

 south. 



And yet the Tweed is not in the first rank of 

 salmon streams. Only the unbroken tradition, 

 the seriousness, the passion make it great. It is 

 too narrow, over long reaches, too pent in. The 

 frequent low water gathers the ascending salmon 

 into struggling masses at the cauls, to the tempta- 

 tion of the lieges ; and keeps the spent salmon in 

 the pools till they are spotted like lepers. On the 

 lash of a sudden thunderstorm it is given over to 

 sudden rushes, which scour the redds and scatter 

 the spawn, for the benefit of greedy pensioners. 

 From the draining of the olden marshes no longer 

 does the syking lend a long tail of slowly sinking 

 water. A swift rise, as sudden a fall, is the 

 record of a spate. Salmon it has in plenty too 



118 



> 



