No pursuit is more sedentary, if one may talk of a sedentary pursuit,
and none more to my taste, than trout-fishing as practised in the
South of England. Given fine weather, and a good novel, nothing can he
more soothing than to sit on a convenient stump, under a willow, and
watch the placid kine standing in the water, while the brook murmurs
on, and perhaps the kingfisher flits to and fro. Here you sit and
fleet the time carelessly, till a trout rises. Then, indeed, duty
demands that you shall crawl in the manner of the serpent till you
come within reach of him, and cast a fly, which usually makes him
postpone his dinner-hour. But he will come on again, there is no need
for you to change your position, and you can always fill your basket
easily--with irises and marsh-marigolds.
[Illustration: "I wade in as far as I can, and make a tremendous swipe
with the rod."]
Such are our county contents, but woe befall the day when I took to
salmon-fishing. The outfit is expensive, "half-crown flees" soon mount
up, especially if you never go out without losing your fly-book. If
you buy a light rod, say of fourteen feet, the chances are that it
will not cover the water, and a longer rod requires in the fisherman
the strength of a SANDOW. You need wading-breeches, which come up
nearly to the neck, and weigh a couple of stone. The question has been
raised, can one swim in them, in case of an accident? For _one_, I can
answer, he can't. The reel is about the size of a butter-keg, the line
measures hundreds of yards, and the place where you fish for salmon
is usually at the utter ends of the earth. Some enthusiasts begin in
February. Covered with furs, they sit in the stern of a boat, and are
pulled in a funereal manner up and down Loch Tay, while the rods fish
for themselves. The angler's only business is to pick them up if a
salmon bites, and when this has gone on for a few days, with no bite,
Influenza, or a hard frost with curling, would be rather a relief.
This kind of thing is not really angling, and a Duffer is as good at
it as an expert.
Real difficulties and sufferings begin when you reach the
Cruach-na-spiel-bo, which sounds like Gaelic, and will serve us as
a name for the river. It is, of course, extremely probable that you
pay a large rent for the right to gaze at a series of red and raging
floods, or at a pale and attenuated trickle of water, murmuring
peevishly through a drought. But suppose, for the sake of argument,
that the water is "in order," and only running with deep brown swirls
at some thirty miles an hour. Suppose also, a large presumption, that
the Duffer does not leave any indispensable part of his equipment
at home. He arrives at the stream, and as he detests a gillie, whose
contempt for the Duffer breeds familiarity, he puts up his rod,
selects a casting line, knots on the kind of fly which is locally
recommended, and steps into the water. Oh, how cold it is! I begin
casting at the top of the stream, and step from a big boulder into a
hole. Stagger, stumble, violent bob forwards, recovery, trip up, and
here one is in a sitting position in the bed of the stream. However,
the high india-rubber breeks have kept the water out, except about a
pailful, which gradually illustrates the equilibrium of fluids in the
soles of one's stockings. However, I am on my feet again, and walking
more gingerly, though to the spectator, my movements suggest partial
intoxication. That is because the bed of the stream is full of
boulders, which one cannot see, owing to the darkness of the water.
There was a fish rose near the opposite side. My heart is in my mouth.
I wade in as far as I can, and make a tremendous swipe with the rod. A
frantic tug behind, crash, there goes the top of the rod! I am caught
up in the root of a pine-tree, high up on the bank at my back. No
use in the language of imprecation. I waddle out, climb the bank,
extricate the fly, get out a spare top, and to work again, more
cautiously. Something wrong, the hook has caught in my coat, between
my shoulders. I must get the coat off somehow, not an easy thing to
do, on account of my india-rubber armour. It is off at last. I cut
the hook out with a knife making a big hole in the coat, and cast
again. That was over him! I let the fly float down, working it
scientifically. No response. Perhaps better look at the fly. Just my
luck, I have cracked it off!
Where is the fly-book? Where indeed? A feverish search for the
fly-book follows--no use: it is not in the basket, it is not in my
pocket; must have fallen out when I fell into the river. No good in
looking for it, the water is too thick, I _thought_ I heard a splash.
Luckily there are some flies in my cap, it looks knowing to have
some flies in one's cap, and it is not so easy to lose a cap, without
noticing it, as to lose most things. Here is a big Silver Doctor that
may do as the water is thick. I put one on, and begin again casting
over where that fish rose. By George, there he came at me, at least
I think it must have been at me, a great dark swirl, "the purple wave
bowed over it like a hill," but he never touched me. Give him five
minutes law, the hook is sure to be well fastened on, need not bother
looking at that again. Five minutes take a long time in passing, when
you are giving a salmon a rest. Good times and bad times and all times
pass, so here goes. It is correct to begin a good way above him and
come down to him. I'm past him; no, there is a long heavy drag under
water, I get the point up, he is off like a shot, while I stand in a
rather stupid attitude, holding on. If I cannot get out and run down
the bank, he has me at his mercy. I do stagger out, somehow, falling
on my back, but keeping the point up with my right hand. No bones
broken, but surely he is gone! I begin reeling up the line, with a
heavy heart, and try to lift it out of the water. It won't come, he
is here still, he has only doubled back. Hooray! Nothing so nice
as being all alone when you hook a salmon. No gillie to scream out
contradictory orders. He is taking it very easy, but suddenly he moves
out a few yards, and begins jiggering, that is, giving a series of
short heavy tugs. They say he is never well hooked, when he jiggers.
The rod thrills unpleasantly in my hands, I wish he wouldn't do that.
It is very disagreeable and makes me very nervous. Hullo! he is off
again up-stream, the reel ringing like mad: he gets into the thin
water at the top, and jumps high in the air. He is a monster. Hullo!
what's that splash? The reel has fallen off, it was always loose, and
has got into the water. How am I to act now? He is coming back like
mad, and all the line is loose, and I can't reel up. I begin pulling
at the line to bring up the reel, but the reel only lets the line
out, and now he is off again, down stream this time, and I after him,
and the line running out at both ends at once, and now my legs get
entangled in it, it is twisted all round me. He runs again and jumps,
the line comes back in my face, all slack, something has given. It
is the hook, it was not knotted on firmly to start with. He flings
himself out of the water once more to be sure that he is free, and I
sit down and gnaw the reel. Had ever anybody such bad fortune, but it
is just my luck!
I go back to the place where the reel fell in, and by pulling
cautiously I extract it from the stream. It shan't come off again; I
tie it on with the leather lace of one of my brogues. Then I reel up
the slack, and put on another fly, out of my cap, a Popham. Then I
fish down the rest of the pool. Near the edge, in the slower part of
the water, there is a long slow draw, before I can lift the point of
the rod, a salmon jumps high out of the water at me,--and is gone!
I never struck him, was too much taken aback at the moment; did not
expect him then. Thank goodness, the hook is not off this time.
The next stream is very deep, strong and narrow; the best chance is
close in on my side. By Jove, here he is, he took almost beside the
rock. He sails leisurely out into the strength of the stream, if he
will come up, I can manage him, but if he goes down, the water is
very swift and broken, there are big boulders, and then a sheer wall
of rock difficult to pass in cold blood, and then the Big Pool. He
insists on going down, I hold hard on him, and refuse line. But he
leaps, and then, well he _will_ have it; down he rushes, I after him,
over the stones, scrambling along the rocky face; great heavens! _the
top joint of the rod is loose_; I did not tie it on, thought it would
hold well enough. But down it runs, right down the line; it must be
touching the fish. It is; he does not like it, he jiggers like a mad
thing, rushes across the Big Pool, nearly on to the opposite bank.
Why won't the line run? The line is entangled in my boot-lace. He is
careering about; I feel that I am trembling like a leaf. There, I knew
it would happen; he is off with my last casting-line, hook and all. A
beauty he was, clear as silver and fresh from the sea. Well, there is
nothing for it but a walk back to the house. I have lost one fly-book,
two hooks, a couple of casting-lines, three salmon, a top joint, and I
have torn a great hole in my coat. On changing my dress before lunch,
I find my fly-book in my breast pocket, where I had not thought of
looking for it somehow. Then the rain comes, and there is not another
fishing day in my fortnight. Still, it decidedly was "one crowded hour
of glorious life," while it lasted. The other men caught four or five
salmon apiece; it is their Red Letter Day. It is marked in black in my
calendar.
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