I go A YEAR OF SPORT AND NATURAL HISTORY. 



the mood for the fly, and then usually only in the months of 

 July and August, when he comes up towards the surface for the 

 pleasant warmth. The minnow, of which this fish is, Hke many 

 another finny viveur, inordinately fond, is best calculated to 

 tempt him in the depths. I have never tried Char with the 

 paternoster, but there seems to be no reason why that killing 

 method in combination with a tempting minnow or two should not 

 be successful. The great depth would no doubt tell somewhat 

 upon the delicacy of touch so requisite in this style of fishing. So 

 little indeed are Char reckoned as sporting fish, and so desperate 

 seems their pursuit, even to the most skilled anglers, that Mr. 

 Cholmondeley Pennell, in his volume of the Badminton Library, 

 dismisses the fish with scant notice. " They are," he says, 

 " unfortunately so seldom captured by the rod and line, that 

 they are objects more of interest to the icthyologist than the fly 

 fisher." And yet on the rare occasions in one's angling career 

 when these most beautiful fish are in the humour, they will 

 take the fly as greedily as the hungriest trout. Sometimes on 

 a warm day in May or June, more often in July and August, will 

 this happen. Such red-letter hours form scarce memories indeed, 

 and will be recalled with regretful pleasure for years after. I 

 shall never forget an afternoon on Loch Tay a few years back, 

 when, quite suddenly, the Char emerged from their seclusion, 

 and for one fascinating spell of forty minutes came repeatedly 

 at my trout flies. 



We had pulled out from Kenmore past that lovely wooded islet 

 whereon two queens of ancient Scotland lie in their quiet graves. 

 The time was summer, the day soft and gleamy, the atmosphere 

 perfection. All around us sprang the very fairest of Highland 



