ON THE THAMES. 319 



took the image to his garden at all, it was chucked 

 overboard again by one of the boys." " What Goths 

 these dredgermen are !" said I ; "are they not, P. ?" 

 " Don't see it," said P. " Don't bother me about your 

 Eomans and your dredgermen 



" Her eyes are 



Confound it all ! you've put the words out of my head 

 again. I wish you would not disturb me when you 

 see I'm thinking." " But you must be disturbed ; 

 here's the place where the jack are. It's no use your 

 saying ' What a bother it is fishing !' when you are out 

 fishing. Get up and fish, you lazy poet. You'll get 

 an idea for your new edition of ' Puck on Pegasus.' 

 I shall go and try yonder back stream while you re- 

 main here." So off I went and caught nothing, of 

 course, but I saw whole nurseries of little fish on the 

 shallows, and was watching them to see what I could 

 learn and bring as evidence in re " the-grand-turning- 

 out-of-young-fish question now being argued in the 

 High Court of Pisciculture." 



A shout from the distant poet, " There he is ! 

 It's the spoon that has done it." " So I perceive," I 

 shouted in return ; " I thought he would." On my re- 

 turn P. explained in the most kind manner that " ' the 

 spoon' was the bait he had put on his line for the 

 sake of giving the jack a new sensation." So we all 

 put on spoons and fished away, but the sensation had 



