FOREST AND STREAM 
flies he made, from his pocket, to give to Daddy. 
Daddy is pretty well tickled over that present, 
and all the rest of the time you are at Mr. John¬ 
son’s he and the driver are as chummy as two 
boys. 
The driver doesn’t go with you to the Branch 
that day; but he lends you the pole and lets 
you have a lot of extra flies. You have a creel 
full of nice trout when you leave the stream at 
sundown. Daddy tells you when you begin fish¬ 
ing, not to keep the little fish, but to throw 
them back into the stream. 
You strike the road about a half mile below 
Mr. Johnson’s, and there you run across a boy 
about your size carrying a nice bunch of trout 
on a piece of fish line. One of them is a great 
big fish that must weigh a pound or more. You 
know afterward tha<: in some localities . a fish 
that weighs a pound isn’t thought very big; but 
that one was a whopper for that region 
“Hello!” the boy says to you, and you say it 
back to him. 
“You’re from the city, I ’spose,” he says next, 
looking you over pretty well. “Say, don’t you 
want to buy my fish? I’ll sell ’em to you or 
a quarter. You don’t ketch a big one like that 
every day.” 
You tell him you haven’t got a quarter with 
you. . , „ T 
“Why, ain’t you from the city? he says. J 
never seen vou round here before. 
“No,” you tell him. “I live in Ellenville.” 
“Well then I should think you would have 
a quarter,” he says; but he isn’t interested in 
vou anv longer, and starts off down the road. 
When you get to the store. Daddy and the 
landlord are there; but the Colonel and the in¬ 
surance man haven't yet come in. Pretty soon 
you see those two coming up the road; and the 
first tiling the Colonel says, is: 
“Holden has cleared out tne stream, to-day. 
I’ll swear lk s been using a net." 
What he said starts some conversation, and 
the landlord and Daddy take a look in tne in¬ 
surance man’s creel. One asks: Did you get 
him below the dam?” and another says: "I’ll bet 
you tnat's the same one that rose to my fly be¬ 
low the big rocks.” You tag along behind the 
others, but don’t get a chance to look in the 
cr^el till the insurance man slips it off his shoul¬ 
ders and lets it down on the counter of the 
store. Then you take a look, and there’s that 
big trout that was on the bunch the boy tried 
to sell to you. \ ou don’t stop to think, but 
just blurt out: 
“O, I could have had him, too, if 1 had only 
had a quarter. The boy offered him to me, 
first.” 
The insurance man wheels round, glares at 
you and then shakes his fist in your face, while 
the others roar and laugh so loudly you almost 
get scared. The Colonel jumps up and down 
on the floor, and then fetches you a crack be¬ 
tween the shoulders that nearly knocks you 
down. 
“Billy, you shall have a fine, new fish pole 
as soon as we get back to town,” he says to you. 
Then he turns to the insurance man. 
“Holden, this is rich enough to spread on 
pound cake,” he says to him. “O, me! O, my! 
Caught him below the apron of the dam, did 
you? Dominie, isn’t there something in Scrip¬ 
ture about the lake that burns with fire and 
brimstone? Say, Holden, did you ever hear 
about that lake? Well, you want to get your 
asbestos life preserver on.” 
Daddy grins when the Colonel asks him that 
question, and says: 
“I wasn’t thinking of that, but of another text: 
'Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings, etc.,’ ” 
and then the Colonel gives you another crack 
between the shoulders. 
By that time you begin to get it through your 
head, that you ought to have kept your mouth 
closed about that boy and the big trout. You 
feel pretty mean, and don’t dare look at the 
insurance man after that. You don’t want to 
stay in the store any longer, and start to sneak 
out. 
“Here, you pocket edition of Benedict Arn¬ 
old,” the insurance man roars at you. “Where 
you going?” 
You don’t like to stop; but you don’t dare to 
light out after that sort of call; so you get 
red in the face and look at the floor all the time 
he is talking to you. 
“Bill, if I had known you and that boy had 
run across each other,” he says, “you could have 
blackmailed me out of a ten dollar bill. The 
next time you catch me buying trout, don’t you 
tell anybody but me. and you’ll get rich in a 
hurry. You hear what I am saying to you.” 
Then he winks one eye at you, and you see he 
isn’t very mad. You feel better right away: 
but you wish harder than ever that you had 
stopped to think before you squirted out any¬ 
thing about that boy. 
(Continued on page 640.) 
