CHAPTER XXVII. 



During our absence there had been most persistent and 

 skillful lishing at Brandy Brook, hut with "unaccountable 

 misses," a In Creedmoor. Indeed, tliat stream \vasa prob- 

 1cm and mystery. Trout of fabulous size leaped and played 

 there daily before the eyes of the eaucr Captain, but with 

 hardly an exception, after the lirst day, they n-fu<ed even- 

 proffered fly and bait of every description. The Captain 

 and the Senator, both veterans of the angle and equal to 

 almo-t any emergency in tin- art. were hopelessly baffled in 

 all their efforts. They discussed those perverse trout up and 

 down, horizontally and diagonally; reealled and applied 

 all known facts and principles relating to the habits and 

 disposition of the trout family; tried, convicted and duly 

 sentenced them to In- caught ; and deinonst rated each niuht, 

 before the full council of the camp lire, that they of n. 

 sity must succumb on the morrow to a shrewdly chosen or 

 newly concocted allurement, lint each morrow the trout 

 woke up wilh a new kink of their own, whereby the plans 

 of these valiant fishermen were brought to naught. Keu 

 ben might smoke, and smoke, and thunderously " A-hem!" 

 as he nightly pondered over the perversity of Brandy 

 Brook trout; the Senator as keen in a trout-hunt as in an 

 argument in a law court might elucidate the principles 

 which, according to undisputed testimony, guide the salmo 



