EPISODICAL 22i 



pools between weeds. Creeping cautiously across the 

 carrier on the upstream side of the road, keeping low so 

 as to be out of sight, and opening the gate wide so as to get 

 through as near the upstream side as possible, I took a 

 wide detour in the meadow and got below the lowest of 

 the three trout. It did not take long to knot on a big 

 Ant. Hardly had it lit above the fish before my line was 

 taut, and my little nine-footer was making the arch of 

 beauty. Down-stream the trout was bustled to the ready 

 net. Now for No. 2. No less willing was he, and in a 

 moment he was on. Down he came plunging, leaving 

 No. 3 quite unscared, and after some anxious moments the 

 net was put under him. The third fish was on the gravel 

 shallow just below the culvert, and took the fly as gaily as 

 the others. He ran for the culvert, but the little rod was 

 equal to its job and beat him down. None of the trio 

 reached two pounds, but none was under one and three- 

 quarters, and all were as handsome as pictures. 



That was an exceptional twenty minutes. Seldom is 

 more than one good fish to be found within, say, a hundred 

 yards of the culvert, and the gravel shallow (with a retreat 

 to the culvert handy) is the usual spot to find him. The 

 new fence run across at the bottom of the gravelly shallow 

 has not altered that. When there is a trout thereabouts, 

 that is where he will be out to feed. What it has altered 

 is the chances of getting at a fish in such a position. 



Still, no position is absolutely impregnable, and twice 

 in two successive years, by good luck, perhaps, as much as 

 by good management, I have extracted a good trout from 

 the culvert pool above that abomination of barbed wire 

 and wood. 



The first occasion was in June, and the grass in the 

 meadow to the west had not been cut. The keeper had 

 told me there was a good trout at the culvert ; and, risking 



