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Second thoughts on 30. iv. xxxiv.

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More and more things transpire about the habits of fish, or at least according to Macdonald’s wisdom. They will not take on a day which is expecting rain.

To-day was broiling hot. The first thing I heard at 9.30 was the plop of a salmon jumping in the Mill Pool, and the last thing I heard at eight o’clock was the same. Between those hours I tried every lure in the box, on casts from 3x to light salmon. The water was very clear and down. I never touched a fish, though I saw more than enough of them. One particular 14-pounder in the Mill Pool used my line as a skipping rope most of the day. I had a last desperate attempt to fascinate him at 7.30, giving him everything from a ¼-inch Claret and Teal to a Gordon of about three inches. But no, he was merely suffering from joie de vivre. To-night the rain is to come, and to-morrow he will be running. Not so courtly as the Spaniards, I called him low words to his face.

So my rod has only equalled the standing pre-May record (1926) established by three gentlemen: but Macdonald and I have made a new high-water mark between us. The Game Books go back to about 1890. Such an amount of luck is enough to be thrilled about. At least I had the decency to stop fishing at eight o’clock, instead of sitting up all night with a worm. To-morrow, my last happy, chaste, sober and early-rising day (how Cobbett would have patted me on the head), I shall devote to trout.

To-day the only thing I caught was a trout of 2 ozs. I smacked its bottom and put it angrily back.

What is the small black bird with a white breast? Dipper, diver or water ousel?

The salmon that leaped was not running. He stayed in the same place and leaped to express himself.

England have my Bones

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