Drink: Bottles by the Tay

A fanatical fisherman died. On arrival in the next world, he found himself on a river. A ghillie was proffering him a 16ft Hardy. ‘This is the life,’ thought the fisherman. ‘Or, rather, the afterlife.’ Within seconds, he made a perfect cast into enticing water: just the sort of pool which would seduce big fish into lingering. Within a few more seconds, his line was racing, the reel screeching, the rod dipping. Five minutes later, a fresh gleaming 30-pounder was on the bank. With arrogant jaws and an angry, imperious eye, this was no mere salmon. He had caught a lord of the river. ‘O death, where is thy sting?’

A second textbook cast, and a similar outcome. He had landed another fish, worthy to lie beside its confrere. ‘O grave, where is thy victory?’ A third cast, and an even finer trophy: a glistening, majestic 40-pound monster. Suddenly, the fisherman felt uneasy. ‘I don’t want to sound ungrateful, but either of the first two would be the high point of a week’s fishing on a great river. I would have been boasting for months. As for this one — I have never caught anything as wonderful. In Scotland these days, hardly anyone does. All of them within an hour: you’re making it too easy.’ ‘Carry on,’ said the ghillie. ‘But my dear fellow, you don’t understand. For a fisherman, this isn’t heaven. It’s hell.’ ‘Where did you think you were?’

In an earthly paradise, on the banks of the Tay, my friend Andrew Gifford has built a fishing palace. Serious fish are caught, but earned. The Tay is a formidable river. In spate, it is a great brown god, sweeping implacably down to the sea. Those who have dealings with it learn to fear its moods.