THE TALE OF THE FISHES 



in the mazy lore. The very rocks with their beryls 

 and garnets and tourmalin prisms, their striations, In- 

 dian kettles, and caverns dripping stalactite, speak in 

 voices of impassioned truth. The mountain streams he 

 fishes and the water gaps disclose their story of erosion, 

 of ranges slowly rising, of rivers enforcing their right 

 of way through barriers which vainly sought to block 

 their paths. His pursuit tends to develop in the angler 

 the instincts of a philosopher. He naturally informs 

 himself also regarding the plant life associated with his 

 sport, the pink and snowy chequer of the spring; the 

 mosses, and fungi and ferns ; the rose purple fire weeds, 

 blue gentians, cardinal clusters, and silvery clematis 

 tangles of the summer; the waxy stems of Indian pipe 

 nodding their corpse-white flowers over the roots on 

 which they feed, and orchid beauties that tessellate the 

 forest floors or hide their blooming wonders in the 

 wannish-gray light of the fens. He loves to familiar- 

 ize himself with the phenomena of their growth and 

 multiplication. He knows the language the wild 

 flowers speak — the trilliums streaked with flame, the 

 anemones and arbutus tufts of May, the slipper-shaped 

 cypripediums, the violets that spangle the meadows, the 



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