70 MINOR TACTICS OF THE CHALK STREAM 



across which my reel-Une lay, began to drag upon 

 it, and completed the extension of the gut by the 

 time the beetle had run a short two yards down the 

 culvert. At once it began to drag back. This 

 was too much for Aunt Sally — to have that 

 beetle scuttling from her when it was almost in 

 her mouth. She came at it, and in a flash secured 

 it ere it could escape from the culvert ; and before 

 she could turn she was skull-dragged out of her 

 fastness and turned down into the stream below. 

 She made a determined fight for it, but she was 

 very soundly hooked, and I gave no needless law, 

 so that her fifteen inches were soon laid out upon 

 the grass. Not knowing of her fame, I was quite 

 content with her one pound eleven ounces ; but an 

 angler who told me of her reputation said she had 

 always been put down as a much bigger fish. An 

 hour later I looked down the culvert again, but 

 the water had dropped some inches, and there was 

 not enough current through the culvert to make 

 it fishable. I had hit the happy moment for the 

 undoing of Aunt Sally. 



OF ATTENTION TO CASUAL FEEDERS. 



The happening fish is a godsend to the angler 

 whom time or trains, failure to find the taking 

 fly, or other act of God or the King's enemies, 

 have prevented from making his basket during the 

 main hatch of duns. By the " happening fish " is 

 to be understood, not the chance riser to a chance 



