138 Rambles with a Fishing-Rod. 



ing of which runs so markedly through Mr 

 Matthew Arnold's ' Scholar Gipsey, and Thyr- 

 sis/ possesses an intrinsic quietness and calm 

 which are very productive of meditation, and 

 what Wordsworth has well described as "the 

 tender peace of rural thought." If the fisher- 

 man on a June evening be casting his fly 

 on the Kentish Darent, as it circles in quiet 

 pools by the banks, white with ox-eye daisies, 

 or sways the green trails of the long-growing 

 weeds, while the notes of the nightingales 

 sound from the neighbouring elms, and 

 " drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds," 

 keen sportsman as he may be, eager as he 

 may be to take fish, and heavy as his basket 

 is, his mind will yet be contemplative, and his 

 mood will often be the same in secluded glens 

 or by lonely mountain streams : he is engaged 

 in a contemplative man's recreation. But there 

 is a very widely different kind of angling, per- 

 haps as an amusement the most perfect sort 

 of fishing, if the chief object of an amusement 

 is to take the thoughts of the fisherman from 

 their accustomed groove and to absorb him 

 in the pursuit of the moment ; and this is 

 fly-fishing for sea -trout albeit it will pall 



