CAPTAIN AND SENATOK GO A-FISHING. 219 



our wortlijr chief , — went down back of the little hotel to 

 the river where it is broad and calm after its plunge over 

 the dam and down the fall. A small, narrow, fiat-bottomed 

 boat was secured, into which got tlie Senator who essaved 

 tlie oars, and the Captain who was to catch the trout. 

 There was altogether too much weight of dignity in one 

 end of the craft, and weight of bodv in the other end, for 

 safet3\ The cockle shell rocked and dipped. The Captain 

 couldn't swim a stroke. 



"Take me asliore, Senator!" cried the Captain; "we 

 shall spill out of this thing, certain! " 



"Oh, no," said the Senator, taking another hitch on the 

 seat to balance the boat; " we'll be all right in a minute." 

 But, as he said so, in came a hotel pitcher full of water, 

 the Captain issued Ids most peremptory orders, and the 

 Senator, who doesn't like a wetting himself, shoved back 

 to the shore. Procuring a small, bare-foated bo}^ — a sort 

 of tug to an ocean steamer — the good Captain again duly . 

 bestowing himself in the stern of the ticklish craft, with 

 his little spiderdike fellow at the oars in place of the Sena- 

 tor, moved beautifully forth, (alas! there was no artist in 

 our company,) casting deftly right and left his choicest 

 tlies, all about the pool, under the rocks and trees, up to 

 the very foot of the descending sheet of the river ; but cast 

 he ne'er so deftly, not a rise did he get. Still he smoked 

 and still he cast, and lustily now, and gently then, did the 

 small boy ply the oars; and the slowly descending sun 

 winked and wooed, and insects hummed and skimmed 

 and dipped in the dimpling water; but never a trout glad- 



