90 PLEASURES OF ANGLING. 



to save him, I instinctively threw myself forward 

 to scoop him up, but failed, and found myself 

 the next instant coming up myself through the 

 pure water into which I had plunged in my fruit- 

 less efforts to save the fish ! WILD never moved a 

 muscle, but pointing to a spot a few rods distant, 

 quietly suggested to me to " swim yonder ; it's a 

 good place to get out at ! " He has never offered 

 to land a fish for me from that day to this. 



I have other pleasant recollections of this Lime- 

 rick. Trees have been climbed, brooks have been 

 forded, and stout garments have been cut, to pre- 

 serve it ; and here it is to-day, good as new and 

 ready for instant service. I shall preserve it as an 

 heir-loom, and it shall go down to posterity with 

 my " silver doctor " certified, under my hand and 

 seal, as a friend who never failed me. 



And here is a Reel, with every movement out of 

 gear and quite as unfit for service as a broken rod. 

 And yet I would as soon think of burning the let- 

 ters of an old friend as to throw it away ; for I 

 never look at it without having come up before 

 me a thousand pleasant reminiscences of angling 

 waters in the Canadas, in Wisconsin, Yermont, New 

 Hampshire, Maine, and the lakes and rivers which 

 make an angler's paradise of our own northern 

 forests. It rendered its first service in the waters 

 of the Chateaugay lakes once famous as the best 



