
ita! be ~ 
~ 
not feel his pulse stir in a struggle with the 
noblest of game fishes? The man who can 
catch trout without feeling the exhilaration 
of the doubtful battle is unfit for that gift of 
the gods—a cloudy day, a quiet air, and a 
deep pool! 
S. Fontinalis puts up the fight of his 
life. To right, to left, his fierce rushes 
carry him into the rapid tumble of the 
mid-water, then into the quiet of the side, 
getting, for awhile, little more line with 
each run, lest he prove too strong for that 
quivering tip. When he has 50 or 60 feet 
of line out the time comes to put on more 
pressure, then the reel sings in a lower 
key, intermitted with the faint buzzing of 
the wind in. The tip is down to its last 
ounce; will it hold? Why did he not get 
the most expensive rod in the store when 
he bought? Why? But the strain eases, as 
the fish is coaxed into the quieter side 
water, and he is commencing to come up 
stream slowly in answer to the reel, when 
he is off again into the swift currents, and 
the fight gocs on, but he grows weaker, 
and is marceuvered to within seeing dis- 
tance. The last struggle comes with the 
flourish of the landing net, but a quick dip, 
a turn of the wrist, a lift, the net turned 
deftly sideways, a scramble up the rocks 
and almost a collapse on the ground, from 
the relieved strain. Our friend does not 
realize until the fight is over, that the trout 
is not the only one who has been on high 
tension! 
The sky is brighter. All nature takes a 
fresh breath and gains new beauty, at the 
. sight of the fish lying curved in the net, its 
sides iridescent, purple, red, white and yel- 
low; the darkly mottled back—is there a 
color of the rainbow not present on the 
body of a freshly caught brook trout? 
Our fisherman puts on a longer leader, 
with a brown hackle, and a grizzly king, 
and walks down stream to the long riffle 
at the head of the great pool. A large flat 
rock, 8 x Io, smooth enough for a tent 
floor, juts from the bank into the edge of 
the current, a foot above the water, the 
rocks above hanging over the platform 
protectingly. No casting is needed here, 
the current is only too willing to do the 
work for him. 
The line drifts down to the left, past the 
bushes, out of sight; the slightly increasing 
pull as the current catches the longer line 
alone telling him that it is afloat, till it is 
far enough below, and he begins reeling in, 
when suddenly he thinks it has snagged, 
and would be sure of it, save for that in- 
describable tugging, quivering, bending of 
the tip. This time the game is easier to 
handle. He is on the side of the swifter 
current, and standing on the rock our 
friend is able to bring him into the quieter 
water, and counts him already creeled. 
Suddenly the line hangs slack; disappoint- 
A DAY FROM A TROUT FISHERMAN'S DIARY. a9 
ment succeeds elation, and he reels in an 
empty line. ‘It is better to have fished and 
lost, than never to have fished at all.” 
It is the disappointment, the lost leaders 
and flies, the snapped tips, the lightly 
hooked fish, that make the pleasure felt 
in a successful play the keener. The man 
who is continually successful never knows 
the satisfaction of the man. who has first 
felt failure. 
The angler now steps into the water, and 
wades out until the riffle nearly tops his 
hip boots. He stands in the full force of 
the miniature rapids, and must needs plant 
his feet solidly on the rocks of the bottom 
to keep his balance. Dropping his new 
leader with its flies into the water, the cur- 
rent takes them from him, till 50 feet are 
out, then he begins to play the flies across 
the current this way and that, reeling in, 
letting out, till splash! the spray jumps as 
the strike comes, almost before he feels the 
tension through the rod, and again is the 
battle royal on, this time in a new phase, 
the fish leaping and fighting along the top 
of the water, and as he comes nearer, one 
can catch glimpses of his fins spread wide 
for a pull, or he lies over on his side to 
make an oblique spurt for smoother water, 
so that he can come up stream faster for 
slack line; but no, the reel buzzes faster, 
the tip takes him away from dangerous 
ground for the present, and the fight con- 
tinues. Steer him carefully away from 
those bush roots which stand in the high 
water of the springtime, and don’t let him 
get the line across or around that rock 
in the middle, placed there as if for an 
anchor of hope and a rock of refuge for 
desperate trout. Reel him in gently, pass 
the net under him, keeping your own bal- 
ance meanwhile, then, splash back to the 
rocky platform you left. Now realize hor 
tired and cold and how happy you are! Get 
out the pocket scales, weigh him, and sat- 
isfy yourself he is a quarter pound heavier 
than the first. Two such fish are enough 
for a reasonable man. 
A faint ‘“whoo-o-p” is heard above the 
roar of the falls back of him, and there 
above him, stands the partner of his joys 
and sorrows, with the lunch. He realizes 
he has the appetite of a wolf, and, stretched 
out in the sun, he satisfies the inner man 
with a gusto the city does not breed. 
Where has the day gone? Father Time 
seems jealous of our friend. 
A rest, some pictures taken to dream 
over in the coming winter, a few more 
casts with varying success, and then the 
trail back to the house is taken, the sag- 
ging weight of the creel at each step a con- 
stant reminder of the fruits of the day’s 
sport. He arrives at the house, and drops 
into an easy chair on the porch, “tired as a 
pup,’ as the evening settles over hill and 
valley. 

