114 SPECKLED TKOUT. 



cattle scare the fish, and soil their element and break 

 down their retreats under the banks. Wood-land 

 alternates the best with meadow : the creek loves to 

 burrow under the roots of a great tree, to scoop out 

 a pool after leaping over the prostrate trunk of one, 

 and to pause at the foot of a ledge of moss-covered 

 rocks, with ice-cold water dripping down. How 

 straight the current goes for the rock ; note its cor- 

 rugated, muscular appearance, it strikes and glances 

 off, but accumulates, deepens with well-defined ed- 

 dies above and to one side ; on the edge of these the 

 trout lurk and spring upon their prey. 



The angler learns that it is generally some obsta . 

 cle or hindrance that makes a deep place in the creek, 

 as in a brave life, and his ideal brook is one that lies 

 in deep, well-defined banks, yet makes many a shift 

 from right to left, meets with many rebuffs and ad- 

 ventures, hurled back upon itself by rocks, waylaid 

 by snags and trees, tripped up by precipices, but 

 sooner jpr later reposing under meadow banks, deep- 

 ening and eddying beneath bridges, or prosperous 

 and strong in some level stretch of cultivated land 

 with great elms shading it here and there. 



But I early learned that from almost any stream in 

 a trout country the true angler could take trout, and 

 that the great secret was this, that whatever bait you 

 used, worm, grasshopper, grub, or fly, there was one 



/thing you must always put upon your hook, namely, 

 your heart ; when you bait your hook with your 

 i, heart the fish always bite ; they will jump clean 



