282 
at 4 o'clock he was outside making 
such a disturbance with the axe that 
Drummer was moved to go forth and 
lecture him. This he did. Dressed in 
a look of stern indignation—and a very 
short and breezy undershirt—he stalked 
up to Scissors and said: 
‘‘Conglomerate your intellectuality ! 
Why in Jehosephat are you performing 
in this indecorous manner. Incorrigi- 
ble, incongruous rascal—”’ but Scissors 
had fled to the woods, and did not come 
back until breakfast was ready. It was 
his last offence of this kind. 
After breakfast we started down 
stream, but did not meet with the suc- 
cess we expected, and soon came back, 
resolved to move on. With three busy 
hands it was short work packing, and 
we were soon upon our way. About 
two miles below our former camp a 
bridge crosses the river, and partially 
underneath and below this bridge lies 
a deep pool, and we discovered it to 
be full of bass. The position of the 
bridge made it very hard to handle a 
fly with any success, so we resorted to 
our bait rods and minnows, and very 
shortly we had eight or ten nice bass 
upon a string. 
It was here that Drummer distin- 
guished himself. For several days I 
had noticed an unusual restlessness 
pervading the man that I could not 
account for. In his sleep I had heard 
him mutter such disconnected senten- 
ces as: 
‘« Twenty-five per cent.’’—‘‘ fair prof- 
it’’—‘‘knew I could make the sale ”— 
etc: 
In the daytime he was often bringing 
to view an old piece of newspaper and 
with much care and labor working over 
a combination, in the end displaying a 
few dimes and quarters. What did all 
this mean? I pondered over it. Was 
The American Angler 
Drummer a miser and was he wretched 
because separated a short time from 
his hoards? I dismissed this from my 
mind as utterly improbable, for did he 
not buy five cents worth of bologna 
with which to refresh us at Colon? 
Base thought, away with it! No; it 
lay deeper. Could he at some time 
have made a sale in which the profit 
was less than fifty per cent., and the 
disgrace of it still worrying him! Or 
had some one given him overchange? 
Surely that would have set lightly on 
his conscience. All this and much 
more passed through my mind, and I 
was now to receive enlightenment. 
A well dressed stranger had been 
watching our manceuvers with much 
interest. From his appearance I took 
him to be from some town or city. 
After the bass quit raising, Drummer 
shook himself together, gave his mus- 
tache on upward twirl, and taking our 
string of fish walked up to the stranger. 
With a polished suavity of address that 
could have been equaled by few, sur- 
passed by none, he said : 
“It is with pleasure that I have 
watched the interest you have taken in, 
our sport ; you, too, are a sportsman, I 
presume ?” 
‘‘ Indeed, sir,’’ said the stranger, ‘‘in 
this you are mistaken. This is the first 
time I ever saw fish caught.” 
‘¢‘Can it be possible? You were not 
brought up in the country then, I'll 
guarantee. Of course you are ac- 
quainted with them as a table deli- 
cacy ?” 
“Well, yess but 1 can’t sayithaie 
am fond of them, they always make 
me sick.” 
“Then it is-clear to me’ that you 
have never tasted St. Jo. river bass. 
The fish in this stream are renowned 
for the extreme delicacy of their flavor 
