SERGEANT WILLIAM PATTERSON. 309 



pike, dogfish and all the other kinds, an* you can just dip 

 'em up by the scoopful; what do you say about going 

 down and getting some?" 



"All right," said Bill; "we'll go in the morning. I've 

 got a dip net that only wants a handle, and I'll put one 

 on in the morning. Come down after breakfast and 

 we'll go. I haven't had a fresh fish this winter, and have 

 forgotten just how they taste." 



Our outfit consisted of a dip net, or a landing net of 

 coarse mesh strung on a fourteen-inch ring, with a rake 

 handle attached; an axe, a spear, or "gig/' and some mos- 

 quito netting, which Henry brought. What the latter 

 was for I had no idea, but then I had not seen the place. 

 It was snowing a little, with hardly any wind. The pool, 

 or pond hole, as Henry called it, might have covered two 

 acres, and had been washed out of the soft soil by the 

 great river some time when it overflowed its banks, and 

 in summer it was dry. A spring came in its eastern edge 

 and kept the ice from making up to the shore. Thou- 

 sands of large fish crowded to this opening for air, and I 

 never saw such a sight before nor since. There must 

 have been many thousands of the different fishes which 

 inhabit the Mississippi River crowded into a small space, 

 those in the rear pushing up to the open place and forcing 

 the others to the shore and around to the rear, as if they 

 said: "You have had your chance to breathe, now make 

 way for us." 



I stood in amazement at the scene. Bill took the axe, 

 and cut the opening larger until the thin ice at the mar- 

 gin was gone and we could stand at the edge. I took 

 the net and dipped up a few fish, trying to select my fa- 

 vorite crappies and small catfish. 



"Let me take that net," said Bill, and he proceeded to 

 lift the fish by the netful. The spear was of no use; it 



