150 GOLDEN DAYS 



to a tempting colour in the pools. The 

 banks were gay with flowers, perfumed 

 with warmth, a-hum with hoarse-voiced 

 bumble-bees. Here and there a swarded 

 orchard stretched to the river-bank, inter- 

 spersed with strips of heather, swampy in 

 places between the knolls of bracken. 

 There was a hatch of fly on the water, yet 

 apparently not a fish was moving. The 

 only thing to be done was to put a 

 hopeful fly over the most likely corners 

 and eddies on the chance of stirring a 

 casual feeder. This can become a dis- 

 tressful occupation after a time if it meets 

 with no response, not even one half- 

 hearted rise. I walked and toiled and 

 perspired under an August sun with no 

 success, till at length the shade of an 

 orchard was reached, and I sat down 

 wearily in the long grass to eat my lunch. 

 Ham-sandwiches at such a time are apt 

 to wear a dry and jaded look. The first 

 did not taste appetising. In fact, it was 

 never finished, for as I munched there 

 came to me a sound, small yet unmistak- 

 able — the watery suck of a feeding fish. 

 Again it happened, and again. Peering 



