XII 
AT THE INN 
OTEL is the fashionable word. I intend 
H nothing derogatory by here resorting 
to the old term, but I think the word 
“inn” conveys at once something more 
of the warmth and the good fellowship associated 
with gatherings of fishermen. It used to be my 
business as a reporter to be present at assemblies 
of all sorts and conditions of men, and even now 
across the span of years I remember the jovial 
company of coursers when the card was drawn, 
and how the expectation of the morrow’s sport 
put every one in good humour. Cricket and 
football reunions, when battles are fought over 
again, have their attraction. In fact, every con- 
course of healthy, wholesome sportsmen, whatever 
be their particular form of sport, commands re- 
spect. The war made soldiers of thousands and 
thousands of these men. They had already 
learned team work—it was instinctively part of 
them—and discipline of a sterner nature came to 
them as no hard lesson. 
Other gatherings have their sponsors but to 
me most human and friendly is a little group of 
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