KNOTS AND KNACKS 123 



in year out, for forty years or more, has lived under 

 official restraint, may crack when the halter is removed, 

 if he has no outside hobby or pursuit with which to 

 occupy his mind. 



Sport is a splendid antidote for the ills of man, but, as 

 creeping age extends its icy grip, the spirit may be 

 willing though the flesh is weak. I write knowingly as I 

 have experienced the cramping tendency of passing 

 years. At forty I was still good for rugger, at fifty I 

 played my last game of cricket on the Trent Bridge 

 ground at Nottingham. Sixty told me that tennis is a 

 trifle too hot, and at seventy I found a round of golf 

 somewhat fatiguing. Now, having passed the allotted 

 span, I have returned more seriously to my first and ever 

 abiding love of angling. Yes, and now when I take the 

 rod in hand and see the glint of the flowing river, the 

 same kind of thrill that coursed through my veins 

 those many years back, still urges me to throw a 

 natty fly. That I am not alone in this wondrous feel- 

 ing is borne out by the voiced opinions of my aged 

 fishing friends. 



One esteemed comrade in arms, who is on the brink of 

 four score years, rises at five o'clock on many mornings 

 during the winter months, makes a long journey by rail, 

 and tramps ,over the soggy and gloom-shrouded meads 

 for the purpose of sitting on the river-bank in the hope 

 of catching a specimen red-fin or a weighty chub. When 

 he returns home late in the evening, with glowing tales 

 of otter and fox, teal and pheasant, and not infrequently 

 with an empty creel, he always says that he has spent a 

 glorious day : such is angling. 



If, therefore, these men of the Civil Service, who die 

 young, had but spent a pound or two on rod and tackle, 

 they would, I venture to think, not only have lived to a 

 riper age, but they probably would have been enamoured 



