76 Recreations of a Sportsman 



long cast to a little bay of delights among the 

 weeds where a diminutive cape came out, but 

 I essayed it, and as my fly hovered over the 

 mystic spot there came a swirl that sent myriad 

 chills down my spine. I missed him, ye gods 

 and fishes! Back came the tapered line over 

 the grass, then it went bounding ahead and 

 dropped, and then, ministers of grace! the un- 

 expected happened, I hooked him. Note the 

 extraordinary circumstance. One of the best 

 fly-casters of this land of feathers had tried and 

 tried again, when along comes a tenderfoot, 

 the trout of the meadows did not even know his 

 face, and with an alien fly, a Coachman of 

 bedraggled aspect, takes the prize. 



There was a moral to this which did not es- 

 cape me; it was, never to enter new fields with 

 an apologetic air or announce your innocence, 

 but rather crowd on all sail, and with assurance 

 at forced draft, put on an appearance of wis- 

 dom, which in nine cases out of ten will win. 

 To digress, I saw a notable illustration of this 

 at Avalon in 1907. A man came into town who 

 had never caught a fish. He visited a shop 

 where large mounted fish were exhibited, and 

 when the owner endeavored to sell him one he 

 replied, " I will go out and catch a larger one 

 than you have." The fish were the records of 

 years, mind you, but that confidence-inflated 

 tenderfoot chartered a launch, disdained all in- 



