As a pilot, the author flies from the remote highlands of Scotland to the quiet creeks of Cornwall, packing into the gun wells of a fighter, or the baggage space of a transport plane, his fishing-rod and a box of flies. In two hundred minutes he flies from London to a remote aerodrome in Scotland where, in the dusk of a silent evening, he catches a basket of trout. Almost the next moment he is forcing his way through an overgrown tangle in a Cornish valley in search of sea-trout.That the roar of a 2,000 horsepower engine should be compatible with a love of quiet waters is not so strange as it perhaps sounds. The author describes how he met a fighter pilot during the height of the Battle of Britain beside a Hampshire chalk stream. Both men had flown many hours that day – one of them in almost continuous combat with the enemy. Both discovered the peace for which they were struggling on the banks of that stream.
Lieutentent Commander Terence Horley flew with the Fleet Air Arm during the second world war. He was a keen fisherman and pilot – he combined his passions for sport and flying and wrote a number of articles and books during the 1940s. He was killed following a glider accident.