INTRODUCTION xxi 



bonca River ! What if the fish were somewhat scarce, 

 was it not worth all the trouble, especially when, perad- 

 ventnre fishing with two or three flies, we sometimes had 

 a brace of onananiche on our cast at the same time ? 

 Then it was excitement indeed ! One up, one down, or 

 perchance it might be both of them out of the water to- 

 gether, their shimmering sides glistening in the sun 

 amidst the spray of the splashing waters, as burnished 

 silver salvers shining through the rainbows of a water- 

 fall. And then the excitement of struggling up those 

 deadly rapids above or below the fearftil cascades of that 

 furious river ! the delight of landing, with the greatest 

 skill, from our, canoe, on some dangerous rock beneath 

 the waterfall, and thence casting the fly in the brou — the 

 white, creamy foam of the first eddy — to see its white 

 and foaming surface broken for a second only, and then 

 to feel something like a young shark tearing at the end 

 of the line ! But have we not been through all this to- 

 gether ? Have we not shot rapids, camped out in bear- 

 infested islands, performed almost impossible portages, 

 travelled for days through the solitude of the mighty and 

 eternal forests ? Ah ! this it is which brings the advan- 

 tages of ouananiche fishing far ahead of all other fishing 

 in the mind of the really enthusiastic sportsman. It is 

 the strange and mighty communings with Nature, in- 

 duced by the dangers and difficulties through which he 

 passes, which to the angler elevate what in other lands 

 may be looked upon but as a trivial sport into a noble 

 pursuit — one of which a fortnight's enjoyment is, with 

 all its perils and excitements, worth a month on the best 

 salmon river that Scotland or Ireland can boast. I have 

 fished with many companions in Scotland, in ISTorway, in 

 Ireland, in Spain, in England, in India, in Asia Minor, 

 in Turkey, in Egypt, in Canada, in British Columbia, 



