96 THE TEOUT. 



Without pretending to rival the hundred and one guides tO' 

 angling that now flood the market, I shall take a glance at a few 

 of the more popular of the angler's fishes ; not, however, in any 

 scientific or other order of precedence, but beginning with the 

 trout, seeing that the salmon is discussed in a separate division 

 of this work. 



Of aU our fresh-water fishes, the one that is most plentiful, 

 and the one that is most worthy of notice by anglers, is the trout. 

 It can be fished for with the simplest possible kind of rod in 

 the most tiny stream, or be captured by elaborate apparatus 

 on the great lochs of Scotland. There are so many varieties of 

 it as to suit all tastes ; there are well-flavoured burn trout, not 

 so large as a small herring, and there are lake giants that, 

 when placed in the scales, will pull down a twenty-pound 

 weight. The usual run of river trout, however, is about six or 

 eight ounces in weight ; a pound trout is an excellent reward for 

 the patient angler. Where a trouting stream flows through a rich 

 and fertile district of country, with abundant drainage, the trout 

 are usually well-conditioned and large, and of good flavour j but 

 when the country through which the stream flows is poor and 

 rocky, with no drains carrying in food to enrich the stream, the 

 fish are, as a matter of course, lanky and flavourless ; they may 

 be numerous, but they will be of smaU size. It is curious, too, 

 to note the diiference of the fish of the same stream : some of 

 the trout taken in Tweed, and in other rivers as well, are sharp 

 in their colour, have fine fat plump thick shoulders, great depth 

 of belly, and beautiful pink flesh of excellent flavour. The 

 flavour of trout is of course dependent on the quality and abun- 

 dance of its food ; those are best which exist on ground-feeding, 

 living upon worms and such fresh-water crustaceans as are within 

 reach. Fly-taking fish — those that indulge in the feed of ephe- 

 merae that takes place a few times every day — are comparatively 

 poor in flesh and weak in flavour. As to where flshers should 

 resort, must be left to themselves. I was once beguiled out to 

 the Dipple, but it is a hungry sort of river, where the trout 

 were on the average only about three ounces, and scarce enough ; 

 although I must say that for a few minutes, when " the feed " 

 was on the water, there was an enormous display of fish, but they 

 preferred to remain in their native stream, a tributary of the 

 Clyde I think. The mountain streams and lochs of Scotland, or 

 the placid and picturesque lakes of Cumberland and Westmore- 

 land, are the paradise of anglers. 



