4 THE TROUT ARE RISING 
brought me to a pause for a few minutes. A 
friend of mine in Johannesburg, has in the hall 
of his house on Houghton Estate, a picture 
which catches your eye as you enter. It shows a 
catch of trout lying on the-river bank, lovely 
fresh, well-conditioned fish, which must have given 
stubborn fights before they were landed. The 
scene is on the Usk. Sucha picture makes one 
look, and look, and forget to go beyond the mat. 
Every hall should be so furnished, to my think- 
ing, for there is hardly anything in nature more 
beautiful than a trout in all its glory. 
Little wonder was it that the sight of those 
trout, that summer evening in the old home, 
inspired the hope that some day....! The 
boy made a big resolve. One day he would 
catch Trout like that ! 
The stages so far had been : (1) Brooklet, (2) 
Canal. Now, the canal had done valuable educa- 
tive work. Its mathematical straightness, its 
soulless regularity, its level banks—it rejoiced in 
the uninspiring title of “The Cut”’—all helped 
by contrast to teach what a little river is. Com- 
mercial, correct, stiff, formal: that was the canal, 
and so to be regarded. Even where its dull, 
respectable track took it through the Deep Cut- 
ting, Cheswardine way, with rural scenes around, 
it was still the same, a canal. But the little river 
had character. It sang a song as it went, it 
“‘showed willing,’ as the homely saying goes. 
It was companionable, full of life ; had its little 
ways. Birds loved the woods by its banks, The 
