Fly-Fishing. 381 



cows stood whisking their tails in calm contentment, as the 

 grateful stream laved their cloven feet and their breath ex- 

 haled the odors of sweet cream, white clover and golden 

 butter. 



As my mare drank deeply from the refreshing stream, I 

 gazed upon the lovely scene, and thought that nowhere else 

 in all the world but in this broad land of ours could such a 

 view be found. 



The sublime glories of the Alps; the soft Italian skies; 

 the splendors of the Tropics; the olive-crovrned hills of 

 Andalusia ; the vine-clad slopes of the Riviera — all alike 

 paled before this calm and peaceful, soul-filling, heart- 

 satisfying, homelike scene. 



But what was that ? — a bar of silvery sheen flashed for 

 a moment in the sun and dropped back into the eddy behind 

 yon huge gray boulder under the clifE! I pretend to be 

 surprised, but — pshaw! how idle it is to attempt to de- 

 ceive oneself. All the time that I was hollowly and falsely 

 descanting upon the matchless beauty of the stream and its 

 surroundings, I, like an artful, double-tongued hypocrite, 

 was watching for the very thing that occurred — the leap 

 of a bass ! 



Silently I rode my mare to the shade of the cliff, tied 

 the reins to the convenient limb of a low-branching elm, 

 unstrapped my umbrella from the saddle, and from its folds 

 drew forth a fly-rod that had been artfully and surrep- 

 titiously concealed there — another evidence of the insin- 

 cerity of man. 



From a corner of my pill-bags I brazenly took out a 

 buckskin bag, in which was a small click reel with its line 

 of enameled silk. From a pocket of my professional coat 

 I brought to the light of day what, ostensibly, purported to 

 be a prescription book, but in reality was a book of flies! 



How guilty I felt ! What an arrant humbug I was ! But 



