THE CONFESSIONS OF A DUFFER 7 



him, and he was a great silly brute of a grayling. 

 The grayling is the deadest-hearted and the 

 foolishest-headed fish that swims. I would as lief 

 catch a perch or an eel as a grayling. This is the 

 worst of it — this ambition of the duffer's, this desire 

 for perfection, as if the golfing imbecile should 

 match himself against Mr. Horace Hutchinson, or 

 as the sow of the Greek proverb challenged Athene 

 to sing. I know it all, I deplore it, I regret the 

 evils of ambition ; but dest plus fort que moi. If 

 there is a trout rising well under the pendant 

 boughs that trail in the water, if there is a brake of 

 briars behind me, a strong wind down stream, for 

 that trout, in that impregnable situation, I am 

 inipelled to fish. If I raise him I strike, miss him, 

 catch up in his tree, swish the cast off into the 

 briars, break my top, break my heart, but — that 

 is the humour of" it. The passion, or instinct, 

 being in all senses blind, must no doubt be heredi- 

 tary. It is full of sorrow and bitterness and hope 

 deferred, and entails the mockery of friends, 

 especially of the fair. But I would as soon lay 

 down a love of books as a love of fishing. 



