140 FISHING GOSSIP. 
tween us and the sun; and ina moment all around 
the dingey becomes black as a wolf's throat. The 
little zephyrs too, which reposed so quietly all the 
morning in the underwood of the islands, by some 
peculiar sympathy with or signal from the cloud 
above, come forth, and with inflated cheeks puff the 
surface of the lake, here and there, into patches of the 
tiniest ripples. Their playful movements, though 
refreshing on a hot morning in June, are fatal to the 
pursuit of sun-spearing while they last. It is one of 
the advantages of large lakes and their scenery to 
supply resources of amusement during intervals when 
eels can’t be seen and other fish won’t bite. There is 
Church Island within the length of the spear-shaft 
from Dingey, in which there is natural history and 
antiquarianism enough to fill a volume. Or if “in 
the vein o’ it,” there are skulls in the old crypt “ with 
mantling ivy clad,” one'of which may serve to point 
the moral of a morning homily on the transient 
glories of men and eels, beginning with, of course, an 
“ Alas, poor Yorick!” The herons, now engaged in 
the interesting work of incubation in the attics of the 
tall firs above your head, will stretch forth their long 
necks in evident admiration of your elocutionary 
essay ; and the grebes and wild ducks, which make 
the best of claguers, will applaud your hits from their 
nests upon the benches of the “pit” below. But lo! 
there’s an interruption of your soliloquy threatened 
