CHAPTER III 



NUPTIAL DRESS AND ETIQUETTE 



ANY angler who has fished for the eastern 

 brook trout along toward the fag end of the 

 season, when the ripened leaves of the sumac 

 begin to whisper of frosts to come, knows full 

 well what I mean by "nuptial dress." Is there 

 in Nature a creature more beautiful than Sal- 

 velinus fontinalis when on courting bent? 

 Then, if ever, he deserves the appellation, 

 "fiower of fishes." What August angler has not 

 heard the phrase, "glow of the trout"? No one 

 who has taken the fish late in the season will 

 quarrel with that word "glow"; for actually the 

 body is possessed of an irradiate brilliancy im- 

 possible of description. Then, too, the texture 

 of the skin is somehow different from other 

 fishes, a condition to be expressed only by the 

 word "velvety." To me fishing for brook trout 

 is comparable only to picking violets in the 

 springtime; and I have much the same feeling 

 when I behold a basket of carefully packed and 

 preserved speckled trout that I have when I see 



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