THE SECRET OF THE CANAL 253 



to be deluded into honest feeding. Many is the hour 

 I have spent trying to tempt them and they are well 

 worth tempting, being fat and heavy but I have never 

 succeeded in catching more than two or three at a 

 time, and those only of the younger sort. 



Still, the canal has never lost its fascination for me. 

 It is a beautiful place, fringed with long grasses and 

 scented water-thyme, shaded here and there with trees, 

 and always full of varied interest. Somewhere along 

 its course one generally sees a kingfisher flash by like 

 an emerald meteor ; at the sedge-lined corners the 

 moorhens are constantly busy ; impudent little dab- 

 chicks suddenly appear, look scornfully at the intruder, 

 and disappear in a ring like that made by a great fish. 

 At every few yards as one walks there is a small boil in 

 the water close to the bank, and if one stops to look 

 one soon sees a baby pike, poised a yard out, and 

 returning one's gaze out of the corner of a watchful 

 eye. Though he dashed off in such a hurry on being 

 disturbed, he is not really alarmed. Even a tiny pike 

 of four or five inches seems to have hereditary pride of 

 race, to know that his family is the most formidable in 

 the fresh waters, and that he has very little to be afraid 

 of, except, perhaps, an encounter with his own grand- 

 parents. You can even touch him with the point of 

 your rod if you advance it very slowly and steadily. 

 Till a pike has had untoward experience of keeper's 

 or poacher's wire noose he seems rather to like that 

 sort of attention. 



But the chief joy of the canal to me is the clearness 

 of its water. Always, as I walk along on a sunny day, 

 my steps get slower and slower, and my eyes are con- 



