bosom of the heaving waters, straight down towards him and the gaff. 

 " But," lie continued, " it may be twenty minutes before I can get him 

 to ride tlie current motionless." 



" Never mind, go one must, and there one must stop, for who can 

 say how long the scramble may last before a fish, hooked in like 

 manner, will bob up here and there and drift down stream with no 

 further strength iir him." 



To be very explicit, from two or three minutes' chat with the 

 ladies en route, and ' from information received," suspicion was roused 

 in more ways tlian one. At all events, the channel through which the 

 day's fishing had been granted was as plain as pikestaff. 



All continued to go smoothly. The audience, chiefly unaccus- 

 tomed to the sport, stood by and kept perfectly quiet. Nothing, in 

 fact, interfered with the Professor in the e.xecution of what is usually 

 considered a ticklish task. From the distance the fish was seen by 

 the gaffer to rise to the surface again and again, always displaying 

 that increased weakness which foreshadows the inevitable ending. It 

 had been so played — given line when floundering about, and shown 

 the butt when settling down — that in him not a single kick remained. 

 And then, dead-beat, he rode crosswise on the current towards the 

 assistant in the waist-deep stream, whereon nothing remained but to 

 deliver the eoiip de graee with the commonest of ease. 



Restrained in triumph as inflexible in disaster, and no less nobly 

 proof against the insidious temptations of success than he was proudly 

 unshaken at the boulder under ruder trials of adversity, the modest 

 angler now faced the audience and extorted the admiration of all. 



," Ah," observed his lordship, " it has indeed been a great and 

 signal victory; the work we have witnessed is of importance, and 



