68 FISHING FOR PLEASURE 



looking at him steadily. There was a suggestion 

 of white teeth under his wrinkled chops; but he 

 turned his head to look back over the way he 

 had come, and presently he disappeared. It was 

 only for a moment; then his eyes were poked 

 cautiously T)y the corner of the rock. He was 

 peeking to see if I was there still. . . . He was 

 uneasy now; a low whining growl came floating 

 up the path. ... I began to talk to him, not 

 humorously, but as if he were a Scotchman, and 

 open to an argument. ' You're in a fix, Moween, 

 a terrible fix,' I kept saying to him softly. . . . 

 ' You have put me in a fix, too. Why don't you 

 climb that spruce and get out of the way?' I 

 have noticed that all wild animals grow uneasy 

 at the sound of the human voice. ... I have a 

 theory also that all animals, wild and domestic, 

 understand more of our mental attitude than we 

 give them credit for. . . . Near him a spruce 

 tree sprang out of the rocks. . . . Then an 

 electric shock seemed to hoist him out of the 

 trail. He shot up the tree in a succession of 

 nervous, jerky jumps . . . and reached the level 

 of the ledge above and sprang out upon it, where 

 he stopped and looked down to see what I 

 would do next. And there he stayed, his great 

 head hanging over the edge of the rock and look- 

 ing at me intently till I rose and went quietly 

 down the trail." 



The next chapter tells the story, and a most 

 amusing one it is, of how Quoskh, the Keen eyed 

 (blue heron), brought up her children, and how 

 she taught them to fish. After watching the 

 method of feeding the young in a nest, and 



