272 A YEAR OF SPORT AND NATURAL HISTORY. 



found myself fast in a lively clean run salmon who made the reel 

 shriek, and did not end his first rush until he had close on a 

 hundred yards of line out. But the hold sufficed, and I held on 

 very hard in order not to waste time, and in ten minutes Jimmie 

 had him in the big landing-net (the use of the gaff on Tweed, from 

 the 15th of September until the ist of May, has very properly been 

 made illegal), a bright twenty-two pounder. The fun then became 

 fast and furious ; fish after fish rose, boldly and well. Some 

 escaped after an intimacy of longer or shorter duration with my flyj 

 but a good many were accounted for, and by two o'clock, when the 

 pangs of hunger began to make themselves felt, we had nine 

 splendid fish and a couple of grilse in the boat. So slow is the 

 current in this fine pool that in order to "bring the fly round" 

 properly it is necessary to begin at the foot. The boat in which 

 the angler stands is then slowly rowed upwards, and the motion 

 thus conveyed assists that of the stream, the line being cast out at 

 a right angle to the boat (which is, of course, kept well out of the 

 fishing-water), and allowed to " come round " until it reaches the 

 near side of the current, where it is permitted to dwell for a few 

 seconds. More than once I lost fish that day by withdrawing the 

 fly for another cast too quickly, only just pricking them ; they had 

 followed it in from the far side, and had waited until it assumed a 

 convenient position before they rose at it. 



Although the work had begun to tell on my backbone, luncheon 

 was very quickly got over, no interval being allowed for " baccy," 

 and with pipes alight we went at it again. The first fish of the' 

 afternoon was a noble fellow of 30 lbs., but not so bright a salmon 

 as most of the others. Then came three others, a grilse and — a 

 catastrophe. The brief autumn day was fast approaching its 



