SALMON FISHING WITH THE FLY. 241 



exultation and joy runs through your veins as those magic 

 words escape your lips. . . . 



The foregoing description, however uneloquent, may give 

 those who have never experienced it a faint idea of what every 

 lover of the sport feels on rising and hooking a salmon. 



Anglers I have heard of who even consider that when once 

 they have hooked their fish, the sport is over, and hand the 

 rod to their attendant to play and land the fish ; but I prefer 

 as long an acquaintance with my salmon as he will vouchsafe 

 me, and nothing would ever induce me to give up the rod to 

 anyone to play a fish if I could avoid it ; besides, there is the 

 finish to look forward to. The few moments of uncertainty 

 just before the fish is being gaffed or landed — particularly if he 

 should be a heavy one, perhaps the biggest you have ever hooked 

 — are most exciting ; and the fishermen who forego this part of 

 the performance, lose, I cannot but think, a good deal of the 

 pleasure of the sport There is also a great risk in handing 

 over the rod to an attendant ; in the act of doing so, the line 

 must necessarily get slack, and, should the point of the hook 

 be only skin deep in the fish, as is often the case, ten to one 

 that the angler and fish will part company. Is there a salmon 

 fisherman of any experience who has not often seen his fly drop 

 out of a fish's mouth, the moment he was gaffed or landed, 

 when the point of his rod was lowered and the line slackened ? 

 It might probably not occur to him to ask himself the reason 

 why the fly had dropped out ; but if it did, the fact would tell 

 its own tale, and he would be made aware that if for one 

 moment he had given the fish a slack line, he would never 

 have been brought to bank. 



If a fish is well hooked, no harm can come by the rod 

 changing hands ; the angler has often to scramble up a steep 

 bank when playing his fish, in order to enable him to follow 

 him, should he have taken a run up or down stream, in which 

 case he will have to hand his rod over for the time being to his 

 attendant ; but, as it is impossible to tell whether a fish is 

 firmly hooked or not, the rod should never change hands if it 



U R 



