596 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Oct. 8, 1910. 
Washington, D. C., Sept. 26 
Norfolk, Va., Sept. 27 
Richmond, Va., Sept. 28 - 
96 ex 100 
96 ex 100 
96 ex 100 
The above scores made by L. S. German 
demonstrate the regularity and reliability of 
1 
1 
s 
he might conceivably have caught a brace of 
chub. 
“And yet,’’ he went on, “see what I have 
taken.” As he spoke he unslung his creel, in¬ 
verted it, and upon the grass there poured a 
cascade of trout—fat, golden, ponderous. In¬ 
stinctively I removed my hat. Lunatic or fan¬ 
tastic, here was my master. “There be a dozen 
and three,” he said in a satisfied voice. "The 
others are above, concealed beneath a bush. 
These since seven of the clock.” “The others,” 
I gasped, “how many, in heaven’s name?” 
“Threescore and two,” he announced simply. 
“Look, you!”—he moved the heap of fish with 
his hand and disclosed a stupendous fish of about 
six pounds’ weight — “here is a shapely gentle¬ 
man. A gladsome time he gave me, forcing me 
to cast all twice to the river. But the floating 
wand betrayed him. I rode my pony into him, 
and now he is mine!” 
“You rode your pony?” “Ay, marry! I’m 
not so young as I was, and old Tom has carried 
me since noon. He has gone round to stable, 
for my turf is not - for hooves to tread.” “Your 
turf?” “Ay, marry!” said the old gentleman 
carelessly, as he placed the fish back in the 
creel. “Hah!” he exclaimed, weighing the thing 
in his hand, “I have seen a worse evening’s fish¬ 
ing. Trust me. There is two stone in there, 
my master.” As he spoke the strap gave be¬ 
neath the inordinate weight of chalk stream 
trout and slipped through his fingers. The creel 
fell to earth. I stooped — for this man was 
worthy of all reverence — and picked the thing 
up, bracing myself unconsciously to lift. • My 
body flew upward with a jerk which caused me 
severe pain, and when I had recovered from the 
shock of surprise the creel was in his hands. 
In the gathering darkness I must have failed to 
take hold of it. 
“Sir,” he said, “I thank you. And now B will 
even wish you .a good night’s rest, and, an you 
angle on the morrow, a fair south wind and a 
dark water.” So saying he began to move si¬ 
lently away. “But don't you fish to-morrow?” 
I cried. It would be an education to see this 
angler at work. 
The river mist was now thickening fast and 
partly by the faint pallor in the west, which was 
all that remained of mid-summer day, partly by 
the golden glow of the moon, now climbing 
among the branches of the elms in the close, I 
could see his vague but comfortable shape amb¬ 
ling softly from me. “Let me see you fish to¬ 
morrow,” I cried. “Nay, nay,” he replied, his 
voice lessened by distance; “not to-morrow, 
gentle sir. I must wait my year—my long, long- 
year.” Again I heard the gentle sigh, and with 
it the dark shadow that was my acquaintance 
became one with the blackness that filled a space 
between two ageless yews.—The Field. 
CHARGED BY ELEPHANTS. 
A correspondent of the London Spectator 
tells of a trip made to the Nilgiri Hills in West¬ 
ern India during the delay of the ship on which 
he was. He had heard that sambur deer were 
plenty there, and though poorly armed, set out 
with one companion. 
The day after reaching a village it was an¬ 
nounced that the night before one of the 
villagers had been killed by a wild elephant. 
It appears that the man, who was a keeper 
of tame elephants used for the purpose of haul¬ 
ing timber in the surrounding jungle, awoke 
hearing a noise in his compound, and presum¬ 
ably thinking that one of his elephants was 
eating his plantain trees, went out to drive the 
beast into its proper Quarters, only to realize 
his mistake when too late to save his life, as 
the elephant was a wild one, and turned on him 
and killed him. 
My .informant, who was an old shikari, told 
me that there was a herd of elephants in the 
vicinity and that they had done a lot of damage 
to the crops, and asked me if I would care to 
have a shot at them. 
Previous to this I had had no really danger¬ 
ous big game shooting, and my companion very 
little experience of any sort of shooting at all, 
and, moreover, I did not feel overconfident with 
regard to my weapons and ammunition, but I 
realized that it was a chance of a lifetime and 
concluded that the opportunity was too good 
to miss. Accordingly I arranged for the best 
shikari in the village to accompany me and for 
three of the jungle people to track the animals, 
and by 8 o'clock we started off. 
About a mile outside the village, while going 
through some paddy fields toward the hills, we 
came upon tracks of elephants in the soft mud, 
and for some distance afterward until well into 
the jungle we had no dufficulty in following 
their footmarks, which steadily went up hill; 
the track was some four feet broad and the 
walking easy, although very hot, so that we 
made good progress for some five miles or so. 
We began to think that the herd had prob¬ 
ably traveled some miles since morning, and 
that it was exceedingly unlikely that we 
should see anything of them, when suddenly 
our trackers came back to tell us that there 
was a herd of elephants feedinc in some bam¬ 
boos about half a mile off. All was now ex¬ 
citement. We jumped up at once and looked to 
our rifles. I gave my shotgun to my shikari, 
one barrel being loaded with ball, the other be¬ 
ing choked, with orders to him to keen close 
behind me and hand it to me if I required it. 
We went slowly and cautiously forward, our 
