FAREWELL FEAST OF ANGLING CLUB. 191 



born rebellions of prejudice, and remodel the precon- 

 ceived notions of those who judged from surface 

 glimpses, and without any proper acquaintance. 



I have often wondered at the respect paid to less 

 amiable men. How they are prated of and homaged 

 as patterns of moral worth how their meagre vir- 

 tues are bandied about from mouth to mouth, and 

 a dignity is given them greater than their merits 

 how, because they industriously cloak up and con- 

 ceal their foibles, therefore they are deemed ever 

 upright, without flaw or blemish, the embodied per- 

 sonifications of human propriety. Not, indeed, of 

 this sort was James Hogg ! he had none of the 

 solemn pragmatism of the scholastic grandee, none 

 of the starch and stiffness of the moral pedant. He 

 despised to affect a gravity and demureness foreign to 

 his buoyant and playful nature, and loved laughing 

 wisdom better than serious folly. I have an esteem 

 for his memory, which is injured none by the carpings 

 and prejudices of others. I knew the man better than 

 they did, and have ever regarded him as uniting in 

 his character many of the most valuable aspects of 

 human virtue. 



But enough of this James Hogg was a zealous 

 angler, and that is saying much for any man. He 

 had the mysteries of the craft at his finger-ends. 

 It was a part of his poetical existence to lavish the 

 forenoon hours abroad by the river-side, enticing the 

 yellow-fins with his big, brown hackles or scrutiniz- 



