132 ON A GLASS ROOF 



I called first on the nearest fisherman, an ancient 

 Canuck, so old, I thought, that, being of no use at 

 home, his grown-up great-grandchildren had sent 

 him fishing. Here he was valuable, for he had 

 the gift of his race, and two or three dozen lusty 

 perch were lying on the ice about him. He kept his 

 short black pipe continually hi blast when not re- 

 charging it, smoking home-grown, greenish-black 

 tobacco twisted into a half-inch rope which must 

 have been endless, and so rank that I thought the 

 friends of his youth in Canada might have their 

 memories of him refreshed with a sniff of it, now 

 that the south wind was blowing. As he knew as 

 little English as I French, we had no very sociable 

 intercourse, and it soon grew rather dull for both 

 of us. So after a short tarry I moved on to the next 

 hole, held by a younger Canadian. He had con- 

 quered the Queen's English, which if he did not 

 murder outright he treated barbarously. He was 

 also a conqueror of fish, and many of his victims 

 lay about him, dead and dying, perch in mail of 

 iron and gold, smelt sheathed in silver, and herring 

 in mother-of-pearl armor of all nacreous hues and 

 tints. 



"You don' ketch no feesh, ain't it?" he cried, 

 with a grin. "Wai, da's too bad. Ah'm sorry, me." 

 I doubted his sorrowing much for this, for these 

 Canucks think all the fish and all the berries belong 

 to them. 



