226 AN ANGLER AT LARGE 



this trout, the truth was not in him. But after 

 slaying a fish of half his measurements, I should 

 have been delirious for a month. Therefore I 

 obtained further and better particulars, not of the 

 trout's size, but of its situation, and thus furnished, 

 after bestowing a smile upon James, son of Joe, 

 I approached the lair of-4his prodigy. 



On peering over the bridge rail, as suggested by 

 James, I perceived a chub of about three pounds 

 weight lying in the water. 



I thought that I had known every fish in this 

 piece of the river, but I was mistaken. Hitherto 

 our chevin has escaped my vigilance. But he is 

 certainly the only one of his breed in the neigh- 

 bourhood. Pike we have, a few, eels abound in 

 certain places, crayfish are found on the drag-net 

 in September, of minnows we have the finest 

 head of any water in England, and there are dace 

 and roach. But we have never previously got 

 down to chevins. 



It would of course be impossible for me to catch 

 this creature. First of all I could not, for I am 

 not sufficiently crafty. But this entirely apart, it 

 would be a gross error even to angle for him. To 

 throw a fly or flies to our chevin (I have no chub- 

 flies) would be to do that thing which of all others 

 he most ardently desires. For to be taken for a 

 trout, that is the chevin's ambition. 



