nyone astray by pretending
to prescribe, advise, or dogmatise. It was not first-rate in the days
of my personal knowledge, but it yielded then as now tolerable coarse
fishing, pike and perch being the standing dish; and there are deep,
slow-going lengths, natural haunts of heavy roach. A brother angler
who knows the river thoroughly had a curious theory about the Loddon
perch. With minnow or worm, he truly said, for I can corroborate him,
"any quantity" of perch of 1/2 lb. or 3/4 lb. might be caught; but
there was also another set of fish of 1 1/2 lb. and upwards--not, of
course, of a distinct breed, but still distinct from the smaller grade
just mentioned. These rarely took a minnow, but a gudgeon on the
paternoster, and on the upper hook thereof, frequently proved fatal to
a two-pounder. One July, within my own remembrance, a splendid fellow
of 3 lb. 2 oz. was taken with a lob-worm from one of the Loddon
milltails.

Much of the Loddon is private fishing, as it has always been, but there
are still portions accessible to the public. The Loddon is closely
associated with the good work done in the whole of that district for
preservation in the interests of the angler, and at one time the
Reading and Henley Associations jointly rented the length from the
Great Western Railway to the Thames (including the St. Patrick stream)
with the object of preservation as a breeding ground for Thames fish.
A change in riparian ownership put an end to this arrangement, but
anglers generally should never forget the time, labour, and enthusiasm
devoted to Thames, Loddon, and Kennet preservation by a band of
workers, amongst whom I must include as one of the invaluables the
friend once or twice referred to in the foregoing notes--Mr. A. C.
Butler, of the _Reading Mercury_. In his own district his is a
household name, and in many a metropolitan club "Old Butler of Reading"
has been familiar for many years as one of those quiet helpers of the
cause who work for the sheer love of it.

Once upon a time when there was no talk of changes, and no great demand
for them, the fishing of the Thames district was the bulk of "Angling"
in the columns of the _Field_ and _Bell's Life_, which then almost
alone made a serious subject of fishing, and amongst the men who wrote
were Greville F., Brougham, and Butler, who was for years and years the
_Field_ correspondent long after the others had passed away. As a man
barely in his sixties one ought no