eading them upon the pin by the loop before the
affair is closed up.

If you are wise, upon a river like the Tweed, where all the fishermen
are men of experience and skill, you will not only ask their advice,
but take it in the main--say, when it suits you. You were pretty
hopeful at the beginning of this final day, though Jamie and his
colleague were cautious in expressing an opinion. No doubt Scotchmen
are nothing if not cautious, and the trifle of doubt they adventured
when they surveyed the sky and studied the water might be merely
national caution asserting itself in the very nature of things. Time
passed, and when at noon or thereabouts you sat down upon that very
comfortable platform near the stern of the boat, and wondered whether
your back were as broken as it felt to be, a cold shiver went through
you as the horrible thought flashed into your mind. "Good heavens!
surely this is not going to be another blank?" The sun, at any rate,
after shining brightly for a couple of hours, retired behind the clouds
now rolling up from south-west; wind, in meagre catspaws, skirmished
across the dub below, reserved for the afternoon, and you prayed that
it would strengthen to half a gale.

That grand water above--all streams of a model character--was fished
fairly, perseveringly; Wilkinson, Jock Scott, Silver Grey, Greenwell,
and Stephenson were tried in succession, large and medium. The
afternoon wore on apace without a sign. Down under the high rocks,
wooded to the water's edge, you repeated the work of the forenoon,
trying, in addition to the flies already named, a harlequin-looking
pattern which you had seen amongst Forrest's tempting collection, a
novelty named Tommy Adkins. It did no effective service, however.
With a levity pardonable at that time you hummed, "Tommy, make room for
your uncle," and put up a large Wilkinson, one of the Kelso-tied double
hooks, than which you cannot get better. Down to the weir and back
again to the same old tune--nothing. An angler from below came up for
a chat and told you that he had taken a grilse, and you envied him the
possession of that measly little kipper.

By and by there was a pluck beneath the water, and you struck.
Whatever else it was, it was no fish; but you carefully winched up and
brought in a black kitten not long drowned. Fortune was not content
with smiting you, it derided. As you blushingly remarked to the
laughing but unappreciative Jamie, this was not