FL Y-FISHING B Y NIGHTLIGHT. 183 



able for the purity of its waters and the charming 

 frame of mountain and pine forest, in which, like a 

 huge mirror, dark in its own lustre, it was partially 

 set. As the shortest way to test the accuracy of the 

 information, I cross-lined an angle of it with some 

 old river-flies supplied by my friend ; but the evening 

 was too calm, and the " mount " too imperfect, for a 

 satisfactory experiment. So I returned to the gardens, 

 to witness half the hierarchy of Olympus playing at 

 " aquatics " through all the curious devices of 

 hydraulic engineering, amongst which Fame, perched 

 on her lofty column in front of the palace, shot a 

 dazzling jet of purest crystal high above the neigh- 

 bouring elms, on which it returned in copious showers 

 of prismatic spray, as many-hued and evanescent as 

 the fallacious voices of her own trump. 



If the indulgent reader who has followed me 

 through this rather devious introduction to the im- 

 mediate object of this paper be not wearied with my 

 discursive flights, I would respectfully invite him to 

 join me in a night excursion to a locality at home, 

 where better sport was to be had in former days than 

 in the royal preserves of San Ildefonso. It is only 

 a stone's-throw (or a " good shout," as our imaginative 

 boatman awaiting us measures space) beyond the 

 green hills in the distance. The glories of a summer 

 sunset will illumine, the dews of evening refresh us 

 on the way. By night-angling, however, I would 



