April, 1920 
FOREST AND STREAM 
173 
only on one’s family. These matters, 
however, are not important enough to 
warrant my not getting on to Elihu. I 
will pause only to insert, for the en- 
couragement of other Simple Simons the 
information that Suit B was an unquali- 
fied success. 
Frankly, I felt very conscious and very 
urban when I descended to breakfast the 
morning after our arrival at the club and 
saw my friends in their elaborate coats, 
. corduroy suits and vivid mackinaws. 
Though my trousers were tucked into a 
pair of preposterous boots (borrowed) 
and my coat kicked up coquettishly over 
my trusty sheath-knife, I felt distinctly 
like an imitation. There was .something 
particularly odious in my watch-charm, 
a dangling affair in the shape of a banjo, 
a relic acquired in undergraduate days 
when, with hair geometrically parted 
down my main axis, I used to plunk my 
way into the hearts of ‘prom’ girls and 
college-widows. Here in the heart of the 
great wilderness it was a gleaming sym- 
bol of inexperience and amateurishness, 
which I craftily covered with my napkin. 
Imagine my surprise and delight as we 
wended our way to the little pier where 
the canoes awaited us, when I discovered 
that I was dressed almost exactly like a 
guide! Think of it! — like a real primeval 
habitant of the woodsy-woods! Yet it 
could not be denied. There they stood, an 
expectant group, gazing up the slope, 
doubtless wondering what effete, broken- 
down products of civilization they were 
going to draw and among them there 
was not the vestige of what might by the 
wildest stretch of the imagination be 
called “a hunting-suit.” My heart leapt 
up when I beheld a group of men who 
might have just stepped off the Hoboken 
ferry, men attired in ordinary dark suits 
and felt hats. The head guide, by way 
of distinction, sported a brown derby 
and patent-leather shoes with elastic in- 
serts. I actually pitied my over-dressed 
friends. 
But I pass on lest I seem to cavil, con- 
fessing in all humbleness that I had 
much to learn. I had to learn, for in- 
stance, how to manage my sheath-knife. 
Not how to use it ; that has ever remained 
a mystery. I often looked at its long 
blade and horn-handle and wished that I 
had a tidy murder on my schedule. But 
for the peaceful pursuits of the Woods- 
man I always resorted to a small three- 
bladed pen-knife which my daughter gave 
me for Christmas. The sheath-knife, 
however, appeared to be de rigeur. My 
friends had them; even the guides had 
them, so I applied myself diligently to 
mastering the techinque of wearing it 
so that it would not inflict a mortal 
wound when I sat down in my canoe or 
catch on a brace and throw me into the 
lake or entangle itself in my line or punch 
me in the abdomen when I made a par- 
ticularly ferocious cast or do any of the 
things of which I soon found it capable. 
To this study, as to the unravelling of 
many other mysteries of the woods, I 
brought patience and devotion, endeavor- 
ing always to preserve the reverential 
attitude of the true neophyte. We fished in 
lakes, in streams, in pools and rapids and 
holes and secret places which my knowing 
campanions averred “looked” as if they 
might contain trout. Personally it seemed 
possible to me that all such enigmatic 
bodies of water might conceal a trout or 
two, a credulousness due probably to my 
Simonesque simplicity. To give the au- 
thorities credit, we did catch fish, fish 
which I considered marvels in size, color, 
courage and edibility. But my compan- 
ions were not satisfied. Apparently it 
was one particular trout they were after. 
“We haven’t caught the Big One yet,” 
they kept repeating. 
D AY after day they sought him with a 
hopeful patience which, considering 
that the club-territory was two 
hundred square miles, mostly under- 
water, was truly admirable. And still 
the Big One eluded us, and night after 
night, before the blazing birch-wood, 
The downfall of Elihu 
they descanted on, and I listened to, the 
infinite mysteries of fly-fishing. 
A strange, fascinating world! Shall 
I ever forget my first restless night on 
balsam boughs when my dreams were 
peopled with the extraordinary flies to 
which I had been introduced, — silver-doc- 
tors, parmachenees, royal-c o a c h m e n, 
tootle-bugs; they all crowded about me, 
lurid and threatening. I must here pay 
passing tribute to fly-fishermen, as such, 
and join them heartily in their contempt 
for that low form of angler who dis- 
graces his guild by descending to the 
use of bait. I know there are some who 
smile inwardly at the narration of this 
or that great “fight” in which the con- 
tending parties are, on the one hand, 
two adult human males armed with 
scientific impedimenta and, on the other, 
one surprisingly small fish. It is not 
perhaps, matter for an epic, but I do 
stoutly maintain that in fly-fishing the 
fly makes all fair, for if ever anything 
were a blatant warning to a fish to 
stop, look and listen before giving way 
to the impulses of appetite it is the 
average bunch of feathers in which the 
hook is concealed. I am not, I hope, a 
coward, but if I ever saw a thing like 
a royal-coachman or a tootle-bug sitting 
on my poached-eggs I should leap out 
the window, and any open-mouthed gog- 
gle-eyed creature that tries to inhale it 
on sight deserves his fate. 
It is this conviction that makes me 
feel so comfortable about Elihu. He 
simply would have it, and he got it- 
Heaven knows, I did my best to frighten 
him away. It was the day before we 
were due to fold up our tents and steal 
southward and I was fishing alone. In 
fact my method of casting absolutely in- 
sured privacy, except for the presence 
of Henri, my guide, the half-witted off- 
spring of fine mixed parentage who still 
possessed sufficient animal cunning to 
lie prone in the stern of the canoe safe 
from the lariat-loops of my line. When 
I ceased my activity Henri would chin 
himself on the thwarts and stealthily 
reach for his paddle. Together we had 
spent a cheerful two hours giving a most 
unlikely back-water the beating of its 
life. 
“Pas de truite,” I blossomed, in pure 
Beaux-Arts. 
“Wah!” responded Henri, keeping a 
wary eye on my line. 
“En avant!” I commanded. 
“Wah, wah,” barked Henri, like a 
human engine-bell, and, in perfect obedi- 
ence the canoe backed slowly into a 
stump. 
You see, Henri and I got on famously. 
He had confessed to me on our first day 
out that it was his initial experience as a 
guide, a fact which was perfectly obvious. 
He had no sheath-knife. Imagine it! This 
enabled me to treat him with pleasant 
superiority. 
D AY was dying gloriously in the west 
while thoughts of dinner rose with 
almost equal beauty in my vest 
when, in emulation of Robert Bruce, I re- 
solved on three more casts before heading 
homeward. As Henri silently went be- 
low in time to avoid a tandem formation 
of whizzing-barbs I experienced that 
rare delight of hooking myself amid- 
ships. To be exact a large and very 
malevolent fly whose name I had never 
been able to pronounce, somehow em- 
bedded himself in the waistcoat of Suit 
B at the precise point where my vitals 
were protected by the absurd dingle- 
dangle of banjo-club days. An irritated 
tugging only complicated matters and I 
finally performed a major operation with 
my trusty pen-knife, cutting the hook 
free and at the same time executing a 
tremendous forward cast. The flies sang 
by my ear, something gleamed, flashed 
. . . struck the water with a mighty 
splash and in another second I sensed 
the magnificent galvanic thrill that only 
comes when a real he-trout takes hold. 
I wish you could have seen Henri. “Une 
grosse!” he roared, popping into his seat. 
He was a boy transformed. He even 
seemed to know the sex of the trout by 
instinct. In fact it must have been en- 
tirely a matter of instinct for all hands, 
for neither of us knew how we backed 
and twisted and turned and kept the 
rod from breaking and dropped the net 
over-board and at last caught a glimpse 
of what looked to me like a large pink 
whale and finally landed him in Henri’s 
(■continued on page 216 ) 
