132 WATERSIDE SKETCHES. 



preferring to husband his strength for subsequent efforts, 

 and watch me fish the rapids for trout. It turned out in the 

 afternoon as it had been predicted. The grayling rose 

 moderately, but whereas in the morning we both missed 

 everything, we now landed all that we touched — eight 

 beautiful fish of about three-quarters of a pound each. 

 When the sun began to touch shadow-land, and the 

 autumnal coolness of evening to succeed, the grayling rose 

 no more. This is their habit, and their habit requires" most 

 careful study both as regards general characteristics and the 

 peculiarities of locality. No fish requires such careful 

 watching as the grayling, and when I hear him condemned 

 or spoken lightly of I suspect that the fault lies with 

 the blamer rather than the blamed. So long as I remained 

 in Wharfedale and in the keeper's neighbourhood, he would 

 in the morning, as a first and prime duty, look round at the 

 sky, and then at the water, and at the insects moving about, 

 and pronounce an opinion as to the probabilities of sport ; 

 and his general accuracy was surprising. 



At Bolton the fish are not numerous : two or three brace 

 constituted a day's average sport ; but I met some fishermen 

 ■who had for a fortnight been unable to take a single 

 grayling, although they had caught a few small trout. Anglersi 

 differ greatly in their estimate of a grayling's weight. One 

 Wharfedale fisher, when I told him I had seen a Hampshire 

 fish that scaled over three pounds and a half, coughed 

 incredulously, and said — 



" Ah, that was a big one indeed." 



Plainly he did not believe me. It is rarely grayling so 

 large as this are seen, and the monster I quote was a 

 supremely ugly fellow. A pound fish is a good one, and 



