226 THE WAY OF A TROUT WITH A FLY 



Ten years later, on a small Surrey brook, I was accom- 

 panied by a friend one August afternoon of a day that 

 had proved aggravating and disappointing to a degree, 

 when we saw a giant rush, which had caught against the 

 herbage growing on the far bank, move as if struck by 

 something small. " A rat," said my friend. " A trout 

 for a tanner," said I. " I know that bobbing-reed trick." 

 The hackled Red spinner on my cast was good enough to 

 try with. It lit at the first instance within two inches 

 of the reed and went under. As it did so the reed bobbed 

 again in the swirl of the pounder which came up and 

 fastened, and was presently carefully restored to the water. 



SPORTING HAZARDS ON A BERKSHIRE BROOK. 



The drought of 191 1 must live long in the memories of 

 fly fishermen, and it may be that in the rough streams 

 commonly known as wet-fly waters sport was at a stand- 

 still for months; but for those whom fate or fortune con- 

 fines to waters within easy access of London there was still 

 sport to be had through the most blazing weather — and 

 sport, at that, at times scarcely inferior to that to be had 

 in more normal seasons. Yet it was with little hope of 

 trout, though with a fixed determination to enjoy the 

 lovely conditions of country and weather, that I descended 

 the hill one mid-September day into a Berkshire valley, 

 traversed by one of the most exquisite winding brooks 

 in the countryside. If the banks are tangled with a wild 

 profusion of bramble and thorn, willow-herb, and mullein; 

 if wild cherry, hazel, and ash are interspersed with alder and 

 willow along its course, with marshy stretches dense with 

 sedgy tussock and flags intervening at intervals, the shallow 

 stretches of the little river-bed are no less overgrown with 

 flag and cress bed, giant bulrush, water crow's-foot, and 

 other vegetation, while snaggy roots of the overhanging 



