ANGLING REMINISCENCES. 13 



rally displayed a knack at getting fish, which occa- 

 sioned even the president to look wonder-struck. 

 Watty died on his bed, at the good old age of 

 eighty-three; and as he was every-body's man, no- 

 body missed or regretted him. 



The last member of the old club our recollection 

 leads us to, and we are often puzzled to comprehend 

 why we have forgotten the others, was Mr Gilbert 

 Guddle of the Brosy-beck Ha'. Mr Guddle was a 

 round, squat, bolus-bellied man, with short, thick 

 stumps, and a most brotherly pair of knees ; his 

 phiz was turnip-shaped, and of a pewter colour 

 about the chin. 'Twas a farce to suspect this gen- 

 tleman of being an angler, and yet he was not with- 

 out his merits as a killer of fish, although we have 

 heard it hinted that the means he adopted for their 

 destruction were not in all respects the most hon- 

 est; nor did Mr Guddle pretend to any secrecy 

 about the matter, but rather prided himself upon 

 his skill in jerking out trout with his hands from 

 under the banks of small streams. The pock-net, 

 too, was a favourite with him, although employed, 

 we suspect, more for the purpose of furnishing a 

 dish for his table (for he possessed an extraordinary 

 and insatiable twist) than of affording him any 

 measure of amusement. Mr Gilbert, more fami- 

 liarly termed Gibby of the Beck, was in his way a 

 kind of humorist, and his visage being at all times 

 a droll one, he was enabled, by the smallest contor- 

 tion of his features, to create a laugh, or, at any rate, 



