In a few minutes a fine dace was swimming in the
gap as merrily as the tackle would let him.
For an hour or more I took short turns up and down the bank, just far
enough from the edge to keep my cork in view. If the jack was there, he
made no sign, and at length my sportsman's eagerness began to flag, and my
eye roamed across the meadows to the church spire, under the shadow of
which life as I could never know it was lilting merrily northwards. Here I
was and here I should remain, like a cabbage, till Death pulled me up by
the roots.
Worthy Master Walton says that angling is the contemplative man's
recreation, and, having had in these later years much to con over in my
mind, I know that he is right. But it is no occupation for a fuming man,
and as I marched up and down I forgot all about my cork, till, with a
short laugh that had the tail of a curse in it, I noted that a real gaff
was a silly weapon with which to cut down an imaginary Highlander, and
turned again to my angling.
And at that very moment a thing happened the like of which I had never
seen before, and have not since seen in another ten years of fishing.
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