HOW I CAUGHT MY FIEST SALMON. 177 



by S. had ceded their places to half-a-dozen perspir- 

 ing Beckys and Dinahs of an undoubted age who 

 were the sole representatives of Mother Eve in the 

 American metropolis ; and last and pleasantest 

 assumption, let it be granted that I, spoilt child of 

 fortune, happened to have 50 loose at my bankers. 



The veriest dolt that ever blundered across the 

 Pons Asinorum can divine the nature of the reply I 

 returned to my Montreal friend's kind invitation, and 

 can picture to himself the glee with which on July 

 1st I embarked on the New York and Washington 

 Air Line on my way to the country of the Canucks. 

 The humours (?) of American travel have been so 

 often described by abler pens than mine, that I shall 

 not attempt to reproduce their details more especi- 

 ally as a residence in the States of some years has 

 stripped the gloss of romance off the main features of 

 "voyaging" viz., candy-eating and expectoration. 

 I will therefore draw a veil a very necessary pre- 

 caution during summer travelling in America over 

 the incidents of the journey northwards ; and, merely 

 raising it from time to time to decline " dime " novels, 

 veteran oysters, and cheap sucrerie, will beg the reader 

 to rejoin me in the hospitable mansion of a Canadian 

 friend, washed, clothed, and in my right mind. Here 

 my host and I discuss cigars and claret-punch, salmon 

 and sherry-cobblers ; and the upshot of our delibera- 

 tions is the purchase by myself of a ticket on one of 

 the steamers that run daily between Montreal and 



VOL. I. JI 



