OF THE FRIENDSHIP OF THE RIVER 15 



no. No tea. Well, a cup while I get on my 

 waders and put the rod together). You are also, 

 sir, to know that it is six years since I said good- 

 bye to this same river Clere, my companion of 

 five summers. How then shall I shift furniture 

 or empty trunks, when he is all agog to greet 

 me? 



Come, let us be off. Will you go with me ? 

 The lady of the house is busy, and I am happy 

 and prepared to prattle. 



I say, sir, that we grow into friendship with a 

 long-fished river as with a good comrade. The 

 odd days, never repeated, that we have had on 

 other waters are comparable to those single, rare, 

 glorious encounters with the choice spirits, which 

 Circumstance forbids us to improve. At the 

 dinner-table, in a railway train, yea, by the water's 

 edge we meet. Heart goes out to heart ; each 

 recognises in the other something of himself. It 

 is a moment pregnant with the excitement of dis- 

 covery, with all the possibilities that congeniality 

 offers. One thinks, " If I were not going to 

 Australia to-morrow ! " ; the other, " Would this 

 man awaited me in Archangel ! I could love him 

 like a brother." Yet, though we never meet 

 again, we remember, not perhaps the name, not 

 perhaps the features, but something which is 

 independent of these accidents. Friendship is 



