6 The Angler's Secret 



What sportsman would go afield with 

 gun or rod if the beauties of nature were 

 not in his path? Who among us would 

 care to bag a quail in our town yard, or 

 flail for fish in a fountain pool? Not the 

 true wing-gun enthusiast who loves to see 

 his setter share the gentle day; not the 

 angler who must have "madrigals upon 

 his way " not these good spirits whom 

 Frank Forester declared "could not pos- 

 sibly be of an unkind, ungentle, or un- 

 manly nature," not these men who are 

 but disciples of such nature lovers as 

 Izaak Walton, William Shakespeare, John 

 James Audubon, Henry William Herbert, 

 Daniel Webster, Henry Thoreau, Alexan- 

 der Wilson, George Washington, and half 

 a hundred other famous noble charac- 

 ters who "dropped their lines in pleasant 

 places." 



Claudius said, "The hunter goes afield 

 for the chase itself, for the love of seeing 

 the hounds run, and is glad if the game 

 escapes." So, if the angler did not lose 



