[Sglib-general] Ot nowadays, though in some earlier period the burn has been diverte

[Molima <fem...@ro...>]

Thout the art. My vocation is fixed, and I have fished to little purpose
all my days. Not for salmon, an almost fabulous and yet a stupid fish,
which must be moved with a rod like a weaver's beam. The trout is more
delicate and dainty--not the sea-trout, which any man, woman, or child
can capture, but the yellow trout in clear water. A few rises are almost
all I ask for: to catch more than half a dozen fish does not fall to my
lot twice a year. Of course, in a Sutherland loch one man is as good as
another, the expert no better than the duffer. The fish will take, or
they won't. If they won't, nobody can catch them; if they will, nobody
can miss them. It is as simple as trolling a minnow from a boat in Loch
Leven, probably the lowest possible form of angling. My ambition is as
great as my skill is feeble; to capture big trout with the dry fly in
the Test, that would content me, and nothing under that. But I can't see
the natural fly on the water; I cannot see my own fly, Let it sink or
let it swim. I often don't see the trout rise to me, if he is such a
fool as to rise; and I can't strike in time when I do see him. Besides,
I am unteachable to tie any of the orthodox knots in the gut; it takes
me half an hour to get the gut through one of these newfangled iron
eyes, and, when it is through, I knot it any way. The "jam" knot is a
name to me, and no more. That, perhaps, is why the hooks crack off so
merrily. Then, if I do spot a rising trout, and if he does not spot me
as I crawl like the serpent towards him, my fly always fixes in a
nettle, a haycock, a rose-bush, or whatnot, behind me. I undo it, or
break it, and put up another, make a cast, and,