SECOND DAY. 39 



" Hark, how through the peopled air 



The busy murmur glows ! 

 The insect youth are on the wing, 

 Eager to taste the honeyed spring, 

 And float amid the liquid noon ; 

 Some lightly o'er the current skim, 

 Some show their gaily gilded trim, 

 Quick glancing to the sun." 



Ha ! the May-fly, too, is rising ; the 

 angler will not leave the river with an 

 empty pannier to-day. 



J. When this fly is on the water, the 

 fish will take no other, I have heard. 



S. Ask those who told you so if they 

 ever tried. But we will soon put it to 

 the test. The mention of that dogma re- 

 minds me that last season, in the month 

 of April, with a cold north-west wind, 

 which curled the surface of the water well, 

 I took, in a part of this stream, within the 

 space of half-a-mile, sixteen brace of fine 

 trouts, and most of them with the artifi- 

 cial May-fly, though of course not one of 

 these creatures had made its appearance. 



