GUDGEON AND BLEAK. 331 



gloves to a young lady who laid a wager that she would catch 

 ten out of a dozen bites, ' nibbles included,' and actually did it. 



Notwithstanding, however, this somewhat feminine reputa- 

 tion, there is no doubt that for male minds also gudgeon-fishing 

 occasionally possesses a peculiar fascination ; and it is mentioned 

 as a fact that the clergyman of a parish near Hampton Court, 

 who was engaged to be married to a bishop's daughter, lingered 

 so long over this sport as to arrive too late for the ceremony, 

 whereupon the young lady refused to be united to one who pre- 

 ferred his basket to his bride. 1 



I used greatly to enjoy a day's gudgeon-fishing myself in my 

 schoolboy days before loftier ambitions had stepped in to throw 

 my punt fishing propensities into the shade ; before I had risked 

 my neck in a helter skelter rush after a 2o-lb. salmon ; exulted 

 in a tussle with that grim cannibal, the pike; or, trout rod in hand, 

 strolled my solitary way by the banks of the arrowy Dart 



Shut in, left alone, with myself and perfection of water. 



But at the time I speak of I was a glutton for Thames punt 

 fishing, and for gudgeon fishing in particular. I remember my 

 enthusiasm effervescing in a semi-jocose article to a sporting 

 contemporary. If I reproduce a part of this article here, my 

 apology must be that it recalls the red letter days of boyish 

 existence, which cannot, alas, be lived over again ; and as I began 

 my fishing experiences on the banks of the Thames, so I may 

 perhaps not inappropriately conclude this book, the last I shall 

 probably ever write on fishing, with a tribute to my Alma Mater. 



'Of all spots and sports, commend me to a good gravelly 

 swim on the Thames in July a punt, a rake, a pretty companion 

 and a day's gudgeon fishing. 



What can be more jolly ? A fellow has come back regularly 

 done up, perhaps, with grind, to spend the " long " at the Grange 

 with the cousins (Julia is a ward in Chancery, I fancy ?) one of 

 those broad white houses to be found nowhere but on the banks 

 of the Thames, with a skirting of pheasant cover or wooded cliff 



1 Jesse's Angler 's Rambles, p. 4. 



