16 THE SALT OF MY LIFE 



in a little over an hour's fishing the basket was a 

 hundred and twenty-five whiting and mackerel, 

 the latter taking the bait so greedily at the top 

 of the water, that it was only by using a heavy 

 lead, to get the hooks past them, that we could 

 pick up the whiting at the lower levels. While 

 the fun was hot, Harcourt was very amused, but 

 he never pretended to be a fisherman, and the 

 first lull in the biting was the signal to go back 

 to the yacht and there fly the last of our kites. 

 That night it came on to blow, and we went down 

 to Plymouth ignominiously by train, leaving the 

 yacht to follow round, and next afternoon we 

 spied her beating round the Yealm, but it was too 

 rough for any more fishing that trip. Two 

 months later I spent ten days at Nuneham for 

 the shooting, having great times in the Pinetum 

 and Lockwood, where pheasants and wild duck 

 fell together. I can see Harcourt before me now 

 as he stood on the little bridge and, shooting with 

 his father's old hammer-gun and black-powder, 

 brought down bird after bird. Walking with the 

 beaters, tapping lustily with sticks, and adjuring 

 the running birds with nautical warmth, were the 

 skipper and steward of the yacht, their professional 

 uniform striking a strangely discordant note in the 

 woodland scenery. The only approach to fishing 

 on that occasion was when Alfred Shaw, also 

 of the party, taught me how to catch a pike 



