XII. How not to Catch a Salmon. "Now, I hold it is not decent for a scientific gent The Society upon the Stanislaus. IF Wilton's eye ever falls upon these pages, he will testify that what I say is true. We had invited him to come for a few days' salmonfishing in our river, which runs into the largest fjord in Norway; and he came. All we knew about him was that he was a Magdalen boating-man, whose father had given one of us some shooting somewhere once; so when I met him on the Domino, as we were getting into Stavanger one rainy morning, I asked him to come over. He arrived towards the end of an August evening, after a ten days' drought, during which the river had fallen as many feet; and just as he was driving the off-wheel of his kariole into the gatepost of our compound, and twisting the stout iron step into a derisivelooking curl, I was reflecting that, if he was not a patient sportsman, he would not thank us for asking him, and if he were not good company, we should not thank him for coming. He was splendidly got-up, and called himself " Briggs" with all the pleasure in life: a patent ventilating leathern helmet, with the brim turned up at the back, adorned his head, while an immense grey-cloth "Newmarket" covered a Norfolk jacket, knickerbockers, and stockings of the three-acres-and-a-cow style of architecture, gay but not gaudy. He also wore a blue corduroy waistcoat shot with red, and the largest pair of yellow boots I ever saw. His face was of the usual undergraduate kind, rather sunburnt, and he flushed slightly as he explained his noisy arrival by saying that the heste had shied at something or other as he turned the corner. We of the log-house introduced each other and unloaded our guest's traps (which included a rod-box that would have set up the whole district), and, after a look at the nearest pool, collected for dinner: afterwards we sat round the empty fireplace and smoked. I have met a good many ardent sportsmen, I have spent pleasant "fishing evenings" with the bestknown anglers of the Fly-Fishers' Club, but I never heard such fish-talk as Wilton's: after a while the other men only spoke to draw him out, but he did not require encouragement. It transpired later, that he had never personally slain anything more soul-stirring than a twopound jack; but at one time I thought that his father must be the pseudonymous owner of one of those fishmongers' shops in Bond Street, or vitally interested in the whaling industry. We learnt that fishing in Norway in any state of weather and water spoils you for everything else in the world: that the real difficulty in trout-fishing is to prevent the fish from rending your cast into as many pieces as there are flies directly it touches the water, and that salmonfishing is really only running up and down with a fish on. He showed us a new kind of reel for spinning, a new knot for attaching flies, and several novelties in minnows. Anderson |