ECHO LAKE. 249 



I have often used a white rag in the evening instead of a 

 white moth. Better still sometimes I have found a strip 

 of the white skin from a shiner's belly. 



And now by your leave we will return to Echo Lake, 

 where I stood with a light Norris rod in hand and two 

 flies on my leader. The wind was heavy, and the waves 

 swashed among the lily pads. A half-hour's casting 

 brought nothing to the surface. It was nearly dark. No 

 fly seemed worth any thing. Black, brown, red, gray, 

 coachman, dun, cinnamon, and even the white moth, so 

 successful at evening on Profile Lake, all failed. Could 

 it be that I had taken the solitary trout of Echo Lake, last 

 of his race ? At length I selected a large fly, with a bril- 

 liant scarlet body and two stiff white wings of the ptarmi- 

 gan feather. One long cast, and as this strange fly, un- 

 like any thing on earth or water, sprang from one wave- 

 top to another, there was a sharp rush, up into the air 

 went a noble fish, and turning over struck down on the 

 fly, and the whirr of the reel made its music in an instant. 

 He was fast and away. A shout warned Frank to come 

 out with his boat, and in a few moments a gentleman who 

 was also near me, and had been casting over the same 

 spot a few moments before, pulled toward me and lay off 

 to see the contest. Small as a trout is, this contest be- 

 tween him and a man is by no means unequal ; and with 

 a strong, lively fish, the chances are against the human 

 in such a case as this. For the wind was heavy and the 

 lily stems were strong and abundant. The fish made a 

 rush for the deep water, which sounds twenty-seven feet 

 outside the lily pads. He had struck on fifty feet of line, 

 and had more than eighty feet out when the lily stems 

 brought him up and made it strongly probable that he 

 would break away from the tackle. For let the uniniti- 



