The Old Fishing Hole. 



to the situation, he burst away with a roar of wings that dis- 

 pelled my day dream. No more pheasants sailed down in the 

 road to be looked at, and I followed the windings of the old 

 road until it brought me out on the bank of the long bayou. 



I had been over this same ground many times before, on 

 fishing and hunting trips; but had always followed along the 

 bank of the bayou and struck the stream above thus cutting 

 off a large bend in the river that swept around to the west and 

 back again. But on this morning, noticing that the water in 

 the bayou was low, I determined to cross the dead water and 

 hunt out the bend beyond. Wading hip deep through the wa- 

 ter, I crossed over the flat, oozy shore on the other side. Here 

 in the soft mud could be seen the clumsy, bear-like tracks of a 

 pair of raccoons, the slouchy, dragging trail of a muskrat, and 

 the dainty foot-prints of the mink on his nightly hunt. At 

 any other time these stories of woods life would have interested 

 me very much ; but this morning I was after other game, and, 

 picking my way through the high grass and ferns, I kept my 

 course to the head of the bend. With an eye to a possible 

 pigeon, I carefully scanned the tall cottonwoods, but without 

 seeing a feather. Coming out on the sloping bank, I saw there 

 was only a thread of a stream where I expected to find the 

 river; the main part of the current ran around the west side 

 of an island which divided the stream at this point. This 

 island was covered with a dense thicket. Moving along cau- 

 tiously across the island, I crept to a point that gave me a view 

 of almost the whole length of the bend, when I beheld a sight 

 that nearly took my breath away. 



The water was clear, with a coarse gravel bottom, and 

 these riffles fairly swarmed with great big redhorse, darting 

 here and there playfully their big back fins sticking out of the 

 water. This secluded spot had not been disturbed by fisher- 

 men for years, and it was too bad to disturb them ; but no emo- 

 tion of pity softened the youthful savagery of my heart. Great 

 was my joy at the discovery, as these darting beauties meant 



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