60 AN ANGLER AT LARGE 



degrees of greater and less perfection. Fourthly, 

 then, I find the man who fishes for the single purpose 

 of successfully deceiving the trout into the belief 

 that he is going to eat a living fly in other words, 

 he fishes for rises. When he addresses himself to 

 his work he is moved by no wish to see his prey- 

 he seeks no prey gasping upon the grass. He 

 sits down before none but the oldest and most 

 circumspect of fishes, those fishes which are the 

 despair of other, of lesser anglers. He will pass a 

 summer casting over one of these, and he will 

 count his time well spent can he but persuade it 

 to open its mouth to him once. He is calm in the 

 presence of the loaded creels of his fellows, for he 

 knows that for him are joys of a rarer and more 

 essential quality than any that visit their degraded 

 bosoms. 



I am now getting on to very high ground. My 

 fifth angler takes his pleasure through a pair of 

 field-glasses. It is his to watch the trout and 

 their ways. He sits by the stream, purged of 

 every thought save the acquirement of know- 

 ledge. It is to him that we owe the priceless 

 information that a trout will rise at other objects 

 than living insects ; small twigs, for example, 

 scraps of straw yes, and the petals of flowers. 



Is it possible, you ask, that angling can be 

 carried yet higher ? The number seven was men- 



