more and more the shooting tenants are preserving waters that used to be
open. The distance to Sutherland makes that county almost beyond the
range of a brief holiday. Loch Leven is nearer, and at Loch Leven the
scenery is better than its reputation, while the trout are excellent,
though shy. But Loch Leven is too much cockneyfied by angling
competitions; moreover, its pleasures are expensive. Loch Awe remains, a
loch at once large, lovely, not too distant, and not destitute of sport.

The reader of Mr. Colquhoun's delightful old book, "The Moor and the
Loch," must not expect Loch Awe to be what it once was. The railway,
which has made the north side of the lake so ugly, has brought the
district within easy reach of Glasgow and of Edinburgh. Villas are built
on many a beautiful height; here couples come for their honeymoon, here
whole argosies of boats are anchored off the coasts, here do steam
launches ply. The hotels are extremely comfortable, the boatmen are
excellent boatmen, good fishers, and capital company. All this is
pleasant, but all this attracts multitudes of anglers, and it is not in
nature that sport should be what it once was. Of the famous _salmo
ferox_ I cannot speak from experience. The huge courageous fish is still
at home in Loch Awe, but now he sees a hundred baits, natural and
artificial, where he saw one in Mr. Colquhoun's time. The truly
contemplative man may still sit in the stern of the boat, with two rods
out, and possess his soul in patience, as if he were fishing for tarpon
in Florida. I wish him luck, but the diversion is little to my mind.
Except in playing the fish, if he comes, all the skill is in the boatmen,
who know where to row, at what pace, and in what depth of water. As to
the chances of salmon again, they are perhaps less rare, but they are not
very frequent. The fish does not seem to take freely in the loch, and on
his way from the Awe to the Orchy. As to the trout-fishing, it is very
bad in the months when most men take their holidays, August and