THE MICROBE 



mates of the house began to talk about trout-fishing as 

 if it were the normal occupation of everybody's leisure 

 hours in the spring-time. Unsuspected rods came out 

 of hidden lairs, and when on an early day a youth 

 of some sixteen summers returned at luncheon time 

 from the river and laid half a dozen quarter-pounders 

 on a plate on the hall table, the insect once again, this 

 time seriously, made demonstrations, and I was soon 

 in a high fever. This was the opportunity no doubt 

 that I had unconsciously been waiting for. The mere 

 sight of these trout, the first I had ever beheld, was 

 enough ; and the flies too had, during this first ac- 

 quaintance with them, an extraordinary fascination. 

 Often in later life have I striven to catch, and with 

 but a faint gleam of success, the glamour which in- 

 vested the first handling of those palmers, black and 

 red, and these blue-uprights of such ancient fame 

 and usage in the west country. 



But a rod ! Now almost anything in reason, even 

 a pony, had horseflesh not been abundant on the spot, 

 might have been included in my outfit for this far 

 country, which had been recommended as a cure for 

 some childish weakness. But a fly-rod was outside 

 the vision of my home circle, for the world, be it 

 remembered, has changed much since those days. 

 The parent in Essex, Northamptonshire, or London 

 is almost as likely nowadays to be a fly-fisher of sorts 

 as a home-bred west-country parson. If he is more- 

 over a fond parent too, he thinks nothing of devoting 

 the expanded modern Easter holidays, sensibly and 

 skilfully contrived no doubt by angling pedagogues, 

 without regard to shifting church festivals, to the 



II 



