H4 FISHING FOR PLEASURE 



Having at length succeeded in catching a 

 grasshopper, the good doctor goes on to tell 

 what further happens. The trout are yonder, he 

 swings his line in the air, gives it a gentle cast 

 towards the desired spot, and a puff of south 

 wind dexterously lodges it in the branch of a 

 tree, and no gentle pull will loosen it. He draws 

 it north and south and east and west ; he gives 

 it a jerk and a pull down; he coaxes it in this 

 way and solicits in that way in vain; he stops a 

 moment to look at the trout and then at his 

 line. Was there anything so vexatious? Would 

 it be wrong to get angry? In fact he feels very 

 much like it. The very things he wanted to 

 catch the grasshopper and the trout he could 

 not, but a tree that he did not want he caught 

 fast at the first throw! He cautiously draws near 

 and peeps down. Yes, there are the trout look- 

 ing at him, and laughing as sure as ever trout 

 laughed. But now, having rigged up afresh, he 

 begins to fish just here the water is mid-leg 

 deep. Experimenting at each forward reach for 

 a firm foothold, slipping, stumbling over some 

 uncouth stone, slipping on the moss of another, 

 reeling and staggering, he says he had a fine 

 opportunity of testing the old philosophical 

 dictum that "one can think of but one thing at 

 a time." One must think of half a dozen of 

 your feet, or you will be sprawling in the brook ; 

 of your eyes and face, or the branches will 



