ROD AND KEEL. 135 



within reach of my arm, and when high up in 

 mid-air he shook himself, the crystal drops were 

 flung into my very face. Perhaps I shall live long 

 enough to forget the picture, as that trout for 

 an instant hung in the air, his blue back and 

 azure sides spotted with gold and agate, his 

 fins edged with snowy white, his eyes protruding, 

 gills distended, the leader hanging from his jaws, 

 while a shower of pearly drojDS were shaken from 

 his quivering sides. He fell; but while still 

 in air the boat glided backward, and when he 

 touched the water I was thirty feet away and ready 

 for his rush. It came. And as he passed us, 

 some forty feet off, he clove the water as a bolt 

 from a cross-bow might cleave the air. Possibly 

 for five minutes the frenzy lasted. Not a word 

 was uttered. The whiz of the line through the 

 water, the whir of the flying reel, and an occa- 

 sional grunt from John as the fish doubled on the 

 boat, were the only sounds to be heard. When, 

 suddenly, in one of Ms wildest flights, the terribly 

 taxed rod straightened itself out with a spring, 

 the pressure ceased, the line slackened, and the 

 fish again lay on the bottom. Wiping the sweat 

 from my brow, I turned to John and said, " What 

 do you think of that ? " 



" Mr. Murray," replied John, laying the paddle 

 down and drawing the sleeve of his woollen shirt 

 across liis forehead, beaded with perspiration, — 



