PICKEREL FISHING 327 



their children ultimately into titbits for the nour- 

 ishing of pickerel. All the pond world knows 

 that and its denizens tremble in the presence of 

 these great-jawed, hook-toothed gobblers of small 

 fry; and that constitutes a proletariat the world 

 over. 



In fishing time the loneliness of the empty lev- 

 els of the ice is broken at dawn by the coming 

 of the crows, especially if there have been fisher- 

 men the day before. Remnants of the fisher- 

 men's noon meal are quite likely to be scattered 

 about the spot where they had their fire, and al- 

 ways the minnows which they took from the 

 hooks at leaving are there, frozen upon the frozen 

 surface. It seems a cold breakfast to us fire- 

 worshipping mortals, but the crows take it eag- 

 erly. Often, too, before it is fairly swallowed 

 fishermen appear, whereupon the crows flap 

 silently but swiftly away. One knows by this 

 action that the fishermen are just men, after all, 

 and not a woodland variety of Peter Pan, though 

 they merely bob up on the pond margin, or per- 

 haps well out on the ice, loaded with their traps 

 and tools. One never sees them coming through 

 the wood or down the street, or getting off trolley 

 cars or out of carryalls, these fishermen, they 



