102 ANGLING SKETCHES 



in the fly-leaves of a copy of Hogg's poems, where 

 I kept my flies. But what joy was there in this 

 while the ' take ' grew fainter and ceased at least 

 near the shore ? Out in the middle, where few 

 flies managed to float, the trout were at it till dark. 

 But near shore there was just one trout who never 

 stopped gorging all day. He lived exactly oppo- 

 site the nick in the distant hills, and exactly a 

 yard farther out than I could throw a fly. He was 

 a big one, and I am inclined to think that he was 

 the Devil. For, if I had stepped in deeper, and 

 the water had come over my wading boots, the 

 odds are that my frail days on earth would have 

 been ended by a chill, and I knew this, and yet 

 that fish went on tempting me to my ruin. I 

 suppose I tried to reach him a dozen times, 

 and cast a hundred, but it was to no avail. At 

 length, as the afternoon grew grey and chill, I 

 pitched a rock at him, by way of showing that I 

 saw through his fiendish guile, and I walked 

 away. 



There was no rise now, and the lake was 

 leaden and gloomy. When I reached the edge of 



