68 ANGLING SKETCHES 



like a stage army, to give an appearance of multi- 

 tude. But this appears improbable. What is 

 certain was our utter inability ever to get a rise 

 from the provoking creatures. The dry fly is 

 difficult to use on a loch, as there is no stream 

 to move it, and however gently you draw it it 

 makes a ' wake ' — a trail behind it. Wet or dry, 

 oi ' twixt wet and dry,' like the convivial person in 

 the song, we could none of us raise them. I did 

 catch a small but beautifully proportioned and 

 pink-fleshed trout with the alder, but everything 

 else, silver sedge and all, everything from midge to 

 May-fly, in the late twilight, was offered to them in 

 vain. In windy or cloudy weather it was just as 

 useless ; indeed, I never saw them rise, except in a 

 warm summer stillness, at and after sunset. Prob- 

 ably they would have taken a small red worm, 

 pitched into the ripple of a rise ; but we did not try 

 that. After a few evenings, they seemed to give 

 up rising altogether. I don't feel certain that 

 they had not been netted : yet no trout seemed to 

 be on sale in the village. Their presence in the 

 water may perhaps be accounted for thus : they 



