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"perhaps eight or ten little things." " Why," said he, "you 

 are fishing with worms, and I never thought of bringing any 

 with me." They seem to prefer worms to-day to any other bait ; 

 we never know when to have them ; sometimes they fancy one 

 bait and sometimes another. You must let me have some of 

 your worms, and you can have some of my baits." Well, I 

 thought, here is a liberal offer : this looks something like being 

 licked, but its no use doing the thing by halves, I may as well 

 kill him with kindness, so I said you are welcome to some of my 

 worms, and as your float and tackle are not quite the thing for 

 worm fishing, I will lend you one. He accepted this offer, and 

 I arranged it for the proper depth, telling him he might fish 

 the same swim in which I was angling. He said that would be 

 against the regulations, as we had agreed to fish at least twenty 

 yards apart ; but I quieted his compunctions by telling him 

 that as I consented to it, no fault could be found. We then 

 fished in the same swim, and he caught the fish as quickly as 

 I did, to his great delight. I then left and went to fish a swim 

 thirty yards below, where in a few minutes I got them to bite 

 as fast as in the first place ; but they went off biting in the 

 place I had left ten minutes after I was gone, for the simple 

 reason that my opponent never thought of throwing in a few- 

 worms. He quickly packed up his traps for the purpose, as I 

 thought, of going to fish another place. But I was mistaken, 

 for he went behind a hedge, lapped up his tackle, and bolted 

 home as fast as his legs could carry him. When I found this 

 to be the case I packed up and went after him, but could not 

 overtake him. At this time it would be about half-past two 

 o'clock. When I got home I went to my uncle and showed 

 him what I had caught, and told him what had occurred. He 

 weighed the fish and found there were seventeen pounds of 

 Hoach, and six or eight pounds of other fish. He then went to 

 my opponent's house and asked him why he ran away. " Oh," he 

 said, " I give in that I have been fairly beaten, but it was unfair 

 on your friend's part to go away and take all the fish with him ; I 

 scarcely got a bite after he was gone." 



