CHAPTER XL 



Sea- Fishing— Loch and Stream Fishing— " Brindled Worms" — Rush-Lights — Buckie-Shell 

 Lamps — The Weasel killing a Hare— Killing a Fallow Deer Fawn. 



Though by no means everjiiliing that we could wish it, the weather 

 of the last fortnight [July 1870] was a decided improvement on 

 that of the preceding, and people have managed to get their hay 

 secured in tolerably good condition after all. No appearance of 

 the much-dreaded potato blight as yet ; pity that it should show its 

 unwished-for face this year at all, for a finer crop never lay ripening 

 in the ground. Something has been done in herring fishing, and 

 there is some prospect of our having enough for local consumption 

 at aU events, and perhaps a little over, which is no small matter in 

 those dear times. Other kinds of fish are plentiful, and, with 

 sufficient leisure for the pastime, there is hardly anything of the 

 kind more enjoyable in fine weather than an afternoon's or early 

 morning's fishing with rod or hand-line. You never, besides, see 

 the country so well as on these occasions, or so thoroughly under- 

 stand the full force of the poet's beautiful line, that in such scenes 



" 'Tia distance l6nds enchantment to the view." 



Any number of trout, too — few of them, however, of any size — may 

 be caught at present in our inland lochs and moimtain streams, and 

 a dish of these speckled beauties, fresh from the basket, is a very 

 good thing indeed, though the grilse and salmon e^ter may turn up 

 his nose in contempt and derision of such " small deer." Let him ; 

 we shall be always prepared to take over /(/6' share along with our 

 own ! A curious request was made to us a short time ago by a 



