222 LOUGH DERG. 



The Parson and the Captain had passed 

 far too many hours of storm and sunshine 

 together not to be fully acquainted with each 

 other's style of fishing ; and no one who 

 saw with what apparent unconsciousness of 

 the other's presence each made his own 

 cast, just as his own line appeared to want 

 it, would have imagined that the whole 

 operation was regulated by an habitual and 

 almost unconscious observation of each 

 other's motions. 



There was at first quite success enough to 

 test the goodness of the extempore flies, and 

 though few fish of much more than a pound 

 weight were taken, and those of a dull brown, 

 out-of-season sort of character, as if they, 

 too, were pilgrims doing penance in an 

 uncongenial locality ; yet, combined with the 

 novelty of the scene and the fineness of the 

 weather, the fishing afforded quite excite- 

 ment enough to keep the interest alive. 



But the breeze gradually dropped. Large 

 splashes of calm, glazy-looking water ap- 

 peared here and there, spreading by little 

 and little over the whole surface, while the 

 rises became more and more infrequent, 

 and, before a dozen fish had been caught, 



