From Fox's Earth 



ground. Trout which simply push their noses 

 out are noiseless. The strike touches, but fails to 

 hold him. From some distant steeple ten o'clock 

 rings. 



" Will you let me see your fly ? " The dweller 

 in the lonely mill house among the trees has come 

 out for the air. There is a fascination in these 

 encounters, in a dimness which blurs the outline 

 and leaves the details to the imagination. He is 

 not very sure of the moth. He prefers grouse 

 and claret, an excellent combination in other 

 things than flies. It is fitting that grouse should 

 be the body, and claret the wings. Every angler 

 has his favourite, and is a dogmatist, whom it is 

 well to humour. 



" And now I shall show you how to use it." I 

 meekly hand him the rod. He lets the fly sink 

 as though it were bait, and drift down the slow 

 stream to the full stretch of the line. He jerks 

 it sharply. Then, or not at all, the trout take. 

 " At least it is so in this water, and I know it as 

 well as a man can do, who keeps his rod up, and 

 his cast on for whenever he is in the mood." 

 When the wheel was slowed and the race ceased 

 to plash, little was there to do save fish. A life, 

 vaguely charming, against a dim monotonous 

 background must it be, with no road to one's 

 fellows save the angler-worn pathway by the 

 stream. Very like a vole's life, and his house on the 

 bank might well have been named Vole's House. 



90 



