158 THE BORDER ANGLER. 



for him to construct a new one that is shortly to share 

 the fate of its predecessor, we most earnestly beseech 

 him to keep his temper. If he gets hot and begins to 

 swear, and in his eager hurry to make up for lost time 

 verifies the maxim that " the more haste the less 

 speed," we advise him to sit down, take out his hand- 

 kerchief and wipe his face, then to examine the con- 

 tents of his pocket-pistol, and coolly reflect what is 

 best to be done. If he goes on without doing so, he 

 will probably entirely lose not only his temper but his 

 time ; he will get into a furious passion, and will ob- 

 stinately declare to himself that he will be dee 'd if he 

 be beaten by trees, let them grow ever so thickly or 

 perversely. And so he will get worse and worse ; keep- 

 ing the recording angel busy for a whole forenoon, the 

 perspiration pouring over his (the angler's, not the 

 angel's) face, his pocket-book rapidly thinning of his 

 favourite flies, and people passing will wonder how the 

 fisher's art should ever have been called the Contem- 

 plative Man's Recreation. We are drawing no fancy 

 picture, but what we ourselves, in common with hun- 

 dreds, have experienced. There is nothing so tempt- 

 ing as a cast that shall bring your fly under some over- 

 hanging branch, where imagination depicts a monster 

 ready to seize it : but if the fly can't be got there, why 

 should you persist in trying it ? Flee the temptation 

 walk a few miles, if necessary, to some point where 

 you have water free from foliage and the result will be 

 that you will preserve your serenity and probably fill 

 your basket. 



Who does not admire trees and rivers in combina- 

 tion ; but let us add, why should the wood and water 



