A DAY S FLY-FISHING. 7 



hard at work, taking stickles by turns, and 

 bending with intense interest over their flies, 

 which play so scientifically upon the dancing 

 stream. What a splendid fish was that which 

 came at the red-palmer of the angler lowest down, 

 but missed it ! And what a shout from one of 

 the others, announcing a half-pounder almost at 

 the first cast fairly killed and basketed ! While 

 whiz goes the reel of the third piscator, whose 

 eagerness in striking too smartly has cost him a 

 splendid Limerick, which has found a lodgment in 

 the mouth of the " little peel" that carried it off 

 so cavalierly. 



Thus they " angle, angle on ;" now raising fish 

 which, somehow or other, do not " take home ;" 

 then hooking a monster which bends the rod like 

 a bow, and straightway escapes after a nimble 

 summerset in the air ; and ever and anon landing 

 a speckled beauty, the red, blue, golden, silvery 

 tints of which commingle so delightfully with the 

 rich green sward on which it lies panting under 



the admiring gaze of its captor. 



***** 



Three hours have now elapsed since our friends 



first wetted their lines. They have fished over a 



couple of miles of first-rate ground, and called a 



halt under that spreading oak by the side of the 



T* 4 



