SALMON ANGLING IN IRELAND. 273 



"What is it?" to Gaff, who was panting and labouring, still 

 about twenty yards ahead. 



*' Should say it's a trout, if puff he wasn't puff, puff so 

 big." 



The fugitive, now in deeper water, turned to bay, but the rod was 

 by this time well over him, at high pressure, and he yielded. 



What a group we should have made had some Leech been at 

 hand to sketch us ! In the centre a glorious trout, with diminutive 

 head, deep flank, broad shoulders, and a side tinged with the ripe 

 glow of a tropic sunset ; over him stooped the reader's old acquaint- 

 ance, fumbling in his pockets for the weighing machine, whilst, 

 wiping an inflamed countenance and getting choked in an abortive 

 effort to hide his laughter, stood the scribe. I was afraid to say so, 

 but in my inmost soul I wished the gentleman who knelt beside the 

 dying fish in an agony of delight, had a change of raiment ; never 

 did man want it more. His patent leathers would never again bear 

 a polish ; that waistcoat, lately white as snow, was henceforth and 

 for ever destined to wear a dirty purple hue. As for his Lincoln 

 and Bennett, and superfine frock coat, I shuddered as I looked, yet 

 the wretched man was utterly oblivious of his condition ; every 

 faculty was absorbed in the contemplation of the expiring 

 beauty. 



"I would'nt have missed this sight for a pound," he said, stroking 

 the vermilion spots for the twentieth time. "I say, you there, you 

 are never going to squeeze it into that basket, are you," to Willie, 

 who, having bent the object of his idolatry head to tail, was about 

 to deposit him in the creel. 



"Dear me" rubbing face, waistcoat, and inexpressibles with a 

 delicate pocket handkerchief till an admirable uniformity of shade 

 was attained "I must go home and change. Only let me have 

 him, I will take him back without brushing off a scale. What 

 weight did you say ? Oh, eight pounds and a half ; thank you." 



Glad to be rid of such an incumbrance so early in the day, we 

 bade our new acquaintance good-bye and pushed on to the next cast. 

 This was a long nanow reach of deep water, with just such a stream 



T 



