CHAPTER III 



A Hertfordshire Trout 



He was at once the most careless and the 

 craftiest of anglers. Careless, because he was 

 wont to fish with a battered old rod, with a 

 line that had been long since worn away at 

 the tapering end, so that it no longer tapered, 

 with flies that no self-respecting tacklemaker 

 would for a moment own to. Crafty, because 

 he would watch a moving trout for an hour, 

 never casting to him till the right moment ; 

 would peer and pry into all manner of odd, 

 out-of-the-way, and, to many folk, impossible 

 nooks and corners in search of fish ; would 

 dib right through a thick alder bush, or over 

 a low willow bough ; would move along the 

 banks, when on the look-out for prey, with 

 all the stealthiness and the care that are 



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