OF ANGLING TROPHIES 123 



bowed low before him, and departed severally in 

 search of plaster-of- Paris. A new era had dawned 

 for anglers. Since that day in order to be a great 

 fisherman it has been necessary to hang great casts 

 on the wall. 



Now if a man shows me a fish a large dead fish 

 which he takes from his creel at the end of the 

 day, I am prepared to hold it a convincing proof 

 of his skill. I do not know how he came by it. I do 

 not know if it was caught on a dry olive or with a 

 worm or with a stroke-hall, whatever that may be. 

 He may have bought it from a boy. He may 

 have charmed it out to him on the bank with the 

 music of the flageolet for all I care. I do not ask 

 these things. He has a fish. I can handle it and 

 recognise it for a fish by its touch and its appear- 

 ance and its fishy smell, or, if it be a grayling, by 

 its delicious odour of wild thyme. I am content. 

 If his fish is bigger than any of mine, I tell him 

 of one much bigger than his which broke me just 

 after I began in the morning, when my gut was 

 not thoroughly soaked. Yet 1 own frankly that 

 he is an angler and I take off my hat to him. 



But a plaster cast is a different affair. On its 

 evidence I would rather hang its owner than yield 

 him a tittle of respect. A plaster cast represents 

 to me nothing but so much coin expended. If I 

 had enough money I could have a cast as big as 



