llow fish.

I was using a light two-handed rod, and fancied that a single Test-fly on
very fine tackle would be the best lure. It certainly rose the trout, if
one threw into the circle they made; but they never were hooked. One
fish of about a pound and a half threw himself out of the water at it,
hit it, and broke the fine tackle. So I went on raising them, but never
getting them. As long as the sun blazed and no breeze ruffled the water,
they rose bravely, but a cloud or even a ripple seemed to send them down.

At last I tried a big alder, and with that I actually touched a few, and
even landed several on the shelving bank. Their average weight, as we
proved on several occasions, was exactly three-quarters of a pound; but
we never succeeded in landing any of the really big ones.

A local angler told me he had caught one of two pounds, and lost another
"like a young grilse," after he had drawn it on to the bank. I can
easily believe it, for in no loch, but one, have I ever seen so many
really big and handsome fish feeding. Loch Beg is within a mile of a
larger and famous loch, but it is infinitely better, though the other
looks much more favourable in all ways for sport. The only place where
fishing is easy, as I have said, is a mere strip of coast under the hill,
where there is some gravel, and the mouth of a very tiny feeder, usually
dry. Off this place the trout rose freely, but not near so freely as in
a certain corner, quite out of reach without a boat, where the leviathans
lived and sported.

After the little expanse of open shore had been fished over a few times,
the trout there seemed to grow more shy, and there was a certain monotony
in walking this tiny quarter-deck of space. So I went round to the west
side, where the water-lilies are. Fish were rising about three yards
beyond the weedy beds, and I foolishly thought I would try for them. Now,
you cannot overestimate the difficulty of casting a fly across yards of
water-lilies. You catch in the weeds as you lift your line for a fresh
cast, and then you have to extricate it laboriously, shortening line, and
then to let it out again, and probably come to grief once more.

I saw a trout rise, with a huge sullen circle dimpling round him, cast
over him, raised him, and missed him. The water was perfectly still, and
the "plop" made by these fish was very exciting and tantalising. The
next that rose took the alder, and, of course, ran right into t