WINTER TALES ON SUMMER PASTIMES. 73 



"There is," I suggested, "one beautiful thing about angling 

 which is well worth taking into account : one never wearies 

 of it. Other pleasures grow stale or insipid, but this acquires 

 new fascination with every new experience. This is the 

 verdict of all who, 'e'en down to old age,' have secured 

 mental rest and physical vigor from the practice of the gentle 

 art, which good Sir Henry Wotton found to be 'rest to his 

 mind, a cheerer of spirits, a diverter of sadness, a calmer 

 of unquiet thoughts, a moderator of passions a procurer of 

 contentedness, begetting peace and patience in those who 

 profess and practice it.' 



"I have a friend who is the very type and embodiment of 

 a happy angler and an honest man. 



'Age sits with decent grace, upon his visage, 

 And worthily becomes his silver locks; 

 He wears the marks of many years well spent, 

 Of virtue, truth well tried, and wise experience.' 



"He has fished for fifty years, and is to-day even more eager 

 to take his place on angling waters* than when he first felt 

 the ecstatic thrill which comes to all who have ever had the 

 good fortune to kill a salmon. Here is what he says to me 



in a recent note: 



"AT HOME. Dec. 12, 1882. 

 *'M>/ dear D.: 



"What has become of you? Have you again been playing Cincin- 

 natus on your Western ranch, or are you simply digging yourself out 

 from beneath the political avalanche under which you and all of us 

 were buried in November? 



"As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so do I pant for the 

 coming of the time of the singing of birds when it will be right to 

 go a-fishing, where 



'Soft whispers run along the leafy woods, 

 And mountains whistle to the murmuring floods.' 



"What a blessed time we shall have (D. V.) exploring the beautiful 

 lakes mapped out for us by our faithful henchman, wherein no white 

 man has ever yet cast a fly 1 I have 'dreams in the night' about them ; 

 for I know what they must be f roin what we have already seen of 

 two of them. Husband your vitality, my dear fellow, that, you may 

 be able to make the circuit. 



"Six months yet before the 20th of June! Meanwhile I will have 

 passed my seventieth birthday, and as you, old chap, are 'there or 

 thereabouts,' you cannot greatly boast over your humble servant. 

 But, next to a vigorous youth commend me to a lusty old age 



