CHAPTER XVII 



SALMON FISHING IN NEWFOUNDLAND * 



Foe, nearly two weeks fishermen's luck — bad 

 luck — had been ours. Clear days and cloudy, hot 

 days and cold had proved equally ineffective in 

 making the salmon rise to our flies. In vain had 

 we used every pattern in the books and whipped 

 the waters from the time when the sun struggled 

 with the morning mists till the glories of the 

 northern sunsets had been lost in the gathering 

 darkness. Four or five fish only had we taken and 

 those small ones, and we felt that the time to 

 become discouraged was about due. Still, each day 

 we started out with renewed hopes and confidence, 

 for it is hard to thoroughly discourage the ardent 

 angler, and so we changed flies and changed flies 

 till our leaden hopes were nigh worn out. Had we 

 not seen fish, perhaps all this perseverance would 

 have died early, but the river was literally alive with 

 fish of all size, from the sprightly grilse that leaped 

 high in the air and scattered the glistening drops 

 like rotary wheels to big heavy salmon that would 

 come to the water's surface with the slow delibera- 

 tion of miniature whales coming up to blow. As we 

 stood in the pools they would play around us, even 

 jumping over our hnes, but take a fly, oh no ! 

 Once in a w^hile, just by way of aggravation, they 



* First published in Country Life in America. 



