Rafael Sabatini and Salmon

Making an excursion into memories of childhood is a temptation in old age although the experience is often painful because of all that is lost, never to be had again. Yet on a rare occasion something may be chanced upon that has a happy extension into the present. Such was the case when looking – after the lapse of decades – into a book which somehow escaped the Reaper. It is a dictionary whose associations will be my subject another day. It has 16 colour plates and as I scanned them I came across one which in childhood had no interest for me, but now made an instant connection with Rafael Sabatini the angler devoted to salmon fishing. (The newspapers were as ready to report news of his fishing as they were ready to report a new book from him.)

from the Daily Mail, 1935

And here is that plate, in which the non-angler who reads Rafael’s fishing stories and articles can see images of what are otherwise only words to seek via the internet!