THE ORNITHOLOGICAL GUIDE. 125 



while it runs ; and at last mingles in the mass of 

 departed rivers in the boundless ocean. The simile 

 is not a bad one, and as a well-chosen simile is to 

 him who wishes for thought without pedantry and 

 formality, what a well-dressed fly is to an angler, it 

 will here be pursued a little further; and this is the 

 more pardonable, that the termination — which at the 

 ocean is tinged with gloom and despair, may be 

 brightened into hope and exultation. 



***** 



" They who pule about the trout, have no com- 

 passion for the fly, to which life is as sweet as to 

 any other living creature. They cry out at the 

 putting of a hook in its jaws, but they mention not 

 the millions of which the same jaws have been the 

 grave ; they complain that a net is spread for the 

 fish, but they never will reflect that the same fish 

 converts the whole stream into a net for the capture 

 of his prey. If there is cruelty in the one case, 

 there must be cruelty also in the other ; but the fact 

 is, there is cruelty in neither. The trout feeds upon 

 the flies ; man feeds upon the trout ; the purposes of 

 life are served ; and nature tempers the supply to 

 the waste. 



" One word more about the cruelty of angling. 

 As man is superior to all other earthly creatures, the 

 purposes of man are those that ought first to be 

 considered ; and there are two points to guide the 

 consideration, — moral justice to ourselves, that we 

 do not waste our time, or injure our sense of right 



