28 AN OPEN CREEL 



to him. I tried to lift him out up the bank, and he 

 fell in again with a splash. It was as bitter a moment 

 as I have known for years, for I was convinced that 

 he was the " monarch of the brook," and that as he 

 hung in the air glory hung with him. I entered the 

 brook afterwards, feeling depressed. Almost at once, 

 however, I saw a trout of two ounces, and that cheered 

 me. He lay in the stickle at the tail of a tiny pool, 

 and rose at something. The fly fell wide of him, but 

 he rushed across at it, and was hooked. Three kicks, 

 and he was off, while the fly was stuck firmly in a 

 bough above. It was another bitter moment, but I 

 put on a new point and fly, and moved to the next 

 pool. Here a precisely similar thing happened, a trout 

 getting off after a second of flurry. And in the next 

 five minutes I lost two more. 



After this the fishing seemed to change its character. 

 Whether it was the weather, or the time of day, or the 

 angle of the sunbeams, I know not, but the trout 

 became wild. I crept up to within switching distance 

 of a pool that turned a sharp corner, and took every 

 care that no part of me or the rod should be visible. 

 Then I put one eye round the corner, and behold ! 

 every fish in the pool was scurrying for shelter ; one of 

 them was a big one, too, like the first I had hooked. 

 Time after time this happened, and it was only in 

 about three places that I got a fly in front of a fish at 

 all. On each of these occasions the little fellow dashed 

 at it like a tiger, but stopped short without taking and 

 examined it minutely, retreating backwards the while. 

 He then returned to his position, and remained 

 motionless. At the second sight of the fly he began 



