BOYHOOD. 19 



The village carpenter lent me his valuable aid in 

 making a wonderful rod in three pieces with tin 

 ferules complete ; floats and lines I made myself. 

 There was on the farm a fine easy-tempered old grey 

 mare with a long white tail. Old Joe the waggoner 

 was proud of this tail, and would never allow us to 

 touch it. Our method of obtaining material for our 

 lines was to catch her in the meadow, coax her up to 

 a gate with a wisp of hay, and while one of us stroked 

 her old nose, the other selected a good hank from her 

 tail, and tied it firmly to a bar of the gate ; we then 

 gave her a swish, and off she went, leaving a nice bit 

 of her tail behind her. She enjoyed the fun, and we 

 got as many long white hairs as would make half a 

 dozen lines. 



We were adepts in line plaiting, nine hairs knotted 

 together, and then divided into three strands of three 

 hairs each. Each strand was passed through a bit of 

 goose quill half an inch long ; into these quills were 

 fixed three bobbins, just firmly enough to allow the 

 hairs to slide out as the plaiting went on ; and our 

 machinery was complete. The knotted end being 

 fastened to some fixture, not infrequently to the knees 

 of our trousers, and the spinning began ; when a hair 

 dropped out another was inserted. Gradually the 

 number was allowed to drop down to six, and thus 

 we got a well-tapered line of five or six yards 

 long. 



In process of time I became the proud possessor of 

 a good fly-rod. A friendly keeper supplied me with 

 flies, and taught me how to make and cast them. 

 Under his able tuition I became far more expert in 



