186 SUPPLEMENT TO THE BOOK OF THE BLACK BASS. 



an eye for every water-snake, and turtle, and bull-frog that 

 stirred within ten rods of him ! 



And when an unlucky muskrat, or kingfisher, or snake, 

 or turtle, or frog showed itself, how he would lay a rock on 

 the butt of his "pole," and start in quest of it; and how 

 these mammalian forays, and ornithic sallies, and reptilian 

 assaults would rest him ; and with what renewed zest he 

 would repair to his fishing, and with what consummate and 

 enduring faith he would spit on his hook, and resume his 

 waiting and watching ! 



Oh ! bright, sunny, golden days of youth ! How far- 

 how very far we have traveled down the stream since then ! 

 We may look back, and through the gaps in the trees, and 

 over the low hills catch a sparkle of the stream behind and 

 above us ; but, alas ! we can never go back never return ! 

 Our course is ever on, on and down, down and the stream 

 is ever widening and growing deeper, until it will soon be 

 lost in the great gulf of the unknown ! 



I have much sympathy, and great respect, if not down- 

 right envy for the still-fisher. There is a juvenility, and a 

 childish faith in his methods that are totally unknown, or 

 utterly lost to the blase old hand at fly-fishing, or minnow- 

 casting. 



His tastes are as simple, his expectations as great, his 

 anticipations as easily satisfied, and his enjoyment as ample 

 as in the pin-hook days of the best of us. He is, indeed, 

 but a child of larger growth. 



His life may have been saddened with the experience of 

 time his hands hardened with years of toil his heart 

 seared with the inhumanity of man but he still retains the 

 innocence and freshness of his youth when seated at the 

 waterside with the " peeled sapling " in his stiffened hands 



