EPISODICAL 227 



trees, stumps that have fallen into the water, and cut 

 brambles piled with drift weed, hanging, perhaps, to 

 broken lengths of barbed wire, provide the trout of this 

 gin clear little river with such shelter as to embolden them 

 to feed at all seasons when food is to the fore. Between 

 these weed-beds, snags, and other obstructions the water 

 runs briskly, scouring little stretches of gravel and shallow 

 silver sand to a dazzling cleanness. Out upon these 

 stretches the smaller trout lie in wait for the hatch of duns 

 which, sooner or later, will provide them with entertain- 

 ment; and it is hard to look over the edge anywhere 

 along the course without driving upstream one or more of 

 them, to startle and send to hiding the better fish above. 



At the spot where I put my rod together the river-bed 

 was too densely fringed on both sides to permit of my 

 casting a line from the bank, and I was thankful for the 

 forethought which had provided me with rubber boots 

 reaching to the knee, and thus enabled me to enter the 

 water and prosecute my campaign from midstream or 

 from under banks, as seemed best from moment to moment. 

 The first thing, however, was to stand still awhile to allow 

 my startled friends to regain their composure. It was 

 wonderful how quickly they did so, seeing that where I 

 stood the water barely covered my ankles and there were 

 few parts of the brook where it would reach to mid-calf — 

 say eighteen inches deep. There was no harm in waiting, 

 as there was yet no fly up, and there were all sorts of 

 delightful country sights and sounds to occupy my atten- 

 tion. A pair of water-rail in particular charmed me with 

 the grace of their movements as they ran along exposed 

 stretches of margin which in ordinary seasons would have 

 been under water. Presently I made out a trout, at a 

 guess a short three-quarters of a pound, lying in the neck 

 of a run near the left bank, a cast up stream. By his 



