ere the fish manage to spawn. The only loch known to me where the
common trout are of equal size, is on the Border. It is extremely deep,
with very clear water, and with scarce any spawning ground. On a summer
evening the trout are occasionally caught; three weighing seven pounds
were taken one night, a year or two ago. I have not tried the evening
fishing, but at all other times of day have found them the "dourest" of
trout, and they grow dourer. But one is always lured on by the spectacle
of the monsters which throw themselves out of water, with a splash that
echoes through all the circuit of the low green hills. They probably
reach at least four or five pounds, but it is unlikely that the biggest
take the fly, and one may doubt whether they propagate their species, as
small trout are never seen there.

There are two ways of enlarging the size of trout which should be
carefully avoided. Pike are supposed to keep down the population and
leave more food for the survivors, minnows are supposed to be nourishing
food. Both of these novelties are dangerous. Pike have been introduced
in that long lovely sheet of water, Loch Ken, and I have never once seen
the rise of a trout break that surface, so "hideously serene." Trout, in
lochs which have become accustomed to feeding on minnows, are apt to
disdain fly altogether. Of course there are lochs in which good trout
coexist with minnows and with pike, but these inmates are too dangerous
to be introduced. The introduction, too, of Loch Leven trout is often
disappointing. Sometimes they escape down the burn into the river in
floods; sometimes, perhaps for lack of proper food and sufficient, they
dwindle terribly in size, and become no better than "brownies." In St.
Mary's Loch, in Selkirkshire, some Canadian trout were introduced. Little
or nothing has been seen of them, unless some small creatures of a
quarter of a pound, extraordinarily silvery, and more often in the air
than in the water when hooked, are these children of the remote West. If
they grew up, and retained their beauty and sprightliness, they would be
excellent substitutes for sea-trout. Almost all experiments in stocking
lochs have their perils, except the simple experiment of putting trout
where there were no trout before. This can do no harm, and they may
increase in weight, let us hope not in wisdom, like the curiously heavy
and shy fish mentioned in the beginning of this paper.

LOCH LEVE