DAYS AT DRIFFIELD 145 



It was 2 p.m. before I got any fishing, and then 

 I settled down to some trout smutting under a tree 

 below the bridge of the first mill. They were very 

 artful, and looked at most things, but would take 

 nothing until I put on one of Mr. Halford's little 

 spinners with a light body. Then at last a fish took 

 fiercely and went straight away, tore line off the reel, 

 came back, and bored heavily in the deep, rough 

 water. " At last a two-pounder," I said to myself, 

 much consoled already. Finally he came reluctantly 

 to the net, and turned out to be a ten-inch fish 

 hooked in the fin. This settled me. I wound up 

 and went off to get tea, leaving all thoughts of fishing 

 till the evening rise. I need not dwell at length on 

 the further features of a deplorable day. I had a 

 long futile tramp down to the lower water. My rod 

 suddenly began to wobble at a ferrule, and had to be 

 roughly spliced with four strips of stick and a piece 

 of string. The fish rose vilely, and were put down 

 at every first cast. I wound up with an inglorious 

 blank. 



But there is one memory belonging to the evening 

 which will always be precious. Just at the moment 

 when patience was being strained to the uttermost, 

 when all the grievous wrongs of a grievous day 

 threatened to culminate in a ridiculous fit of temper 

 and despair, there came to my ears a glorious burst 

 of sound, thrilling on the evening air as though the 

 sun were sinking to rest amid the music of the spheres. 

 It was nothing of that sort, of course, only the Driffield 

 town band, which had just begun an evening per- 

 formance in some meadow near the river. But it 



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