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Presented to Princeton Theological Seminary

By the He^- Wendell Pfimc, D.D.

To be Kept Always as a Separate Collection.

sec

I GO A-FISHING

BY

W. C. PRIME

NEW YORK:

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS. 1873-

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by

Harper & Brothers,

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.

HIC

NULLA VOX MONTANI FLUMINIS

NUMERUS NULLUS AQUARUM

TALIS QUALIS EST

ILLIC

UBI IN RIPIS SACRIS JUCUNDITATE

PERENNI QUIESCUNT QUORUM IN

MEMORIAM ALMAM SCRIPTUM EST

HOC VOLUMEN.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

I. WHY PETER WENT A- FISHING 9

11. AT THE ROOKERY 22

III. ISKANDER EFFENDI 37

IV. MORNING TROUT ; EVENING TALK 6^

V. SUNDAY MORNING AND EVENING 82

VI. AN EXPLORING EXPEDITION I09

VII. THE ST. REGIS WATERS IN OLD TIMES 122

VIII. THE ST. REGIS WATERS NOW 138

IX. CONNECTICUT STREAMS IS7

X. AMONG THE FRANCONIA MOUNTAINS 1 78

XI. ON A MOUNTAIN BROOK 2o8

XII. ON ECHO LAKE 235

XIII. THREE BOTTLES OF CLARET 253

XIV. WHAT FLIES TO CAST ON A SUNDAY 287

XV. IN NORTHERN NEW HAMPSHIRE 30I

XVI. AT THE FERNS 321

XVII. GOING HOME 351

WILL YOU GO?

Good friend, you have read the title-page hereof, tell- ing you that I propose to go a-fishing, and the table of contents, which has given you some idea as to where I think of going. If you turn over this leaf it will imply that you accept the invitation to go with me. But be warned in time. The best of anglers does not always find fish; and the most skillful casting of a fly does not always bring up trout. Often chubs and perch and red- fins — yea, even pickerel and pumpkin-seeds — rise to the fly, and you may be thereat disgusted. You can not be sure that you will find what you want, or what you will like, if you go beyond this page. If, however, you have the true angler's spirit, and will go a-fishing prepared to have a good day of it, even though the weather turn out vile and the sport wretched, then turn over the leaf and let us be starting.

I GO A-FISHING.

I.

WHY PETER WENT AFISHING.

The light of the long Galilee day was dying out beyond the peaks of Lebanon. Far in the north, gleaming like a star, the snowy summit of Hermon received the latest ray of the twilight before gloom and night should descend on Gennesaret. The white walls of Bethsaida shone gray and cold on the northern border of the sea, looking to the whiter palace of Herod at its farther extremity, under whose very base began the majestic sweep of the Jordan. Perhaps the full moon was rising over the desolate hills of the Gadarenes, marking the silver pathway of the Lord across the holy sea. The stars that had glorified his birth in the Bethlehem cavern, that had shone on the gar- den agony and the garden tomb, were shining on the hill- sides that had been sanctified by his footsteps. The young daughter of Jairus looked from her casement in Capernaum on the silver lake, and remembered the solemn grandeur of that brow which now, they told her, had been torn with thorns. The son of her of Nain climbed the rocks which tower above his father's place of burial, and gazed down into the shining water, and pondered whether

lO I GO A-FISHING.

he who had been murdered by the Jerusalem Hebrews had not power to say unto himself "Arise."

Never was night more pure, never was sea more win- ning; never were the hearts of men moved by deeper emotions than on that night and by that sea when Peter and John, and other of the disciples, were waiting for the Master.

Peter said, " I go a-fishing." John and Thomas, and James and Nathanael, and the others, said, "We will go with you," and they went.

Some commentators have supposed and taught that, when Peter said, " I go a-fishing," he announced the inten- tion of resuming, at least temporarily, his old mode of life, returning to the ways in which he had earned his daily bread from childhood ; that his Master was gone, and he thought that nothing remained for him but the old hard life of toil, and the sad labor of living.

But this seems scarcely credible, or consistent with the circumstances. The sorrow which had weighed down the disciples when gathered in Jerusalem on that darkest Sabbath day of all the Hebrew story, had given way to joy and exultation in the morning when the empty tomb revealed the hitherto hidden glory of the resurrection, joy which was tenfold increased by an interview with the risen Lord, and confirmed by his direction, sending them into Galilee to await him there. And thus it seems incredible that Peter and John — John the beloved — could have been in any such gloom and despondency as to think of re- suming their old employment at this time, when they were actually waiting for his coming who had promised to meet them.

Probably they were on this particular evening weary with earnest expectancy, not yet satisfied ; tired of waiting

HAVE YOU ANY FISH? II

and longing and looking up the hill-side on the Jerusa- lem road for his appearance; and I have no doubt that, when this weariness became exhausting, Peter sought on the water something of the old excitement that he had known from boyhood, and that to all the group it seemed a fitting way in which to pass the long night before them, otherwise to be weary as well as sleepless.

If one could have the story of that night of fishing, of the surrounding scenes, the conversation in the boat, the unspoken thoughts of the fishermen, it would make the grandest story of fishing that the world has ever known. Its end was grand when in the morning the voice of the Master came over the sea, asking them the familiar ques- tion, in substance the same which they, like all fishermen, had heard a thousand times, " Have you any fish ?"*

* John xxi., 5 : " Children, have ye any meat ?" This translation, though literal, does not convey the idea of the original. The Greek is IlaiSia, fit] Ti Trpoa^ciywv tx^re ; and the word Tzpoatpayiov is used here, as in the best of the later Greek authors, to signify the kind of eatable article which the persons addressed were then seeking. Un- willing, in a matter of such importance (for every word of the Lord is of the highest importance) to trust my own limited knowledge of Greek, I read this page to one of the most trustworthy and eminent American scholars and divines one evening in my library, and the next morning received from him this note, which I take the liberty of appending :

"October 21st, 1872.

"My dear Sir, — You are quite right in your interpretation of John xxi., 5. ' Meat,' in Luke xxiv., 41, is simply /^^^, (ipMaifioc, any thing to eat. But, in John xxi., 5, the word is trpoa^ayiov^ something eatable (but especially flesh or fish) in addition to (Trpoc) bread, which in Palestine was then, as now, the chief diet of the people. Had the disciples been out hunting, the meaning would have been ' Have you any game ?' As they had been all night fishing, the meaning was, and they so understood it, ' Have you any fish ?'

" Yours very truly, ."

12 I GO A -FISHING.

I am afraid that there was something of the human nature of disappointed fishermen in the Galilaeans that morning when they saw the gray dawn and had taken no fish, for their reply was in much the same tone that the unsatisfied angler in our day often uses in answer to that same inquiry. It is just possible that John, the gentle John, was the respondent. It may have been the some- what sensitive Peter, or possibly two or three of them to- gether, who uttered that curt " No," and then relapsed into silence.

But when the musical voice of the Master came again over the water, and they cast where he bade them, John remembered that other day and scene, very similar to this, before they were the disciples of the Lord, when he went with them in their boat and gave them the same command, with the same miraculous result, and said to Simon, " Henceforth thou shalt catch men."

The memory of this scene is not unfitting to the mod- ern angler. Was it possible to forget it when I first wet a line in the water of the Sea of Galilee ? Is it any less likely to come back to me on any lake among the hills when the twilight hides the mountains, and overhead the same stars look on our waters that looked on Gennesaret, so that the soft night air feels on one's forehead like the dews of Hermon ?

I do not think that this was the last, though it be the last recorded fishing done by Peter or by John. I don't believe these Galilee fishermen ever lost the love for their old employment. It was a memorable fact for them that the Master had gone a-fishing with them on the day that he called them to be his disciples ; and this latest meeting with him in Galilee,, the commission to Peter, " Feed my sheep," and the words so startling to John, " If I will that

THE LOVE OF FISHING. I3

he tarry till I come " — words which he must have recalled when he uttered that last longing cry, " Even so come, Lord" — all these were associated with that last recorded fishing scene on the waters of Gennesaret.

Fishermen never lose their love for the employment. And it is notably true that the men who fish for a living love their work quite as much as those who fish for pleas- ure love their sport. Find an old fisherman, if you can, in any sea-shore town, who does not enjoy his fishing. There are days, without doubt, when he does not care to go out, when he would rather that need did not drive him to the sea ; but keep him at home a few days, or set him at other labor, and you shall see that he longs for the toss of the swell on the reef, and the sudden joy of a strong pull on his line. Drift up alongside of him in your boat when he is quietly at his work, without his knowing that you are near. You can do it easily. He is pondering solemnly a question of deep importance to him, and he has not stirred eye, or hand, or head for ten minutes. But see that start and sharp jerk of his elbow, and now hear him talk, not to you — to the fish. He exults as he brings him in, yet mingles his exultation with something of pity as he baits his hook for another. Could you gather the words that he has in many years flung on the sea-winds, you would have a history of his life and adventures, min- gled with very much of his inmost thinking, for he tells much to the sea and the fish that he would never whisper in human ears. Thus the habit of going a-fishing always modifies the character. The angler, I think, dreams of his favorite sport oftener than other men of theirs. There is a peculiar excitement in it, which perhaps arises from somewhat of the same causes which make the interest in searching for ancient treasures, opening Egyptian tombs,

14 I GO A -FISHING.

and diggino^ into old ruins. One does not know what is under the surface. There may be something or there may be nothing. He tries, and the rush of something startles every nerve. Let no man laugh at a comparison of trout-fishing with antiquarian researches. I know a man who has jdone a great deal of both, and who scarcely knows which is most absorbing or most remunerating ; for each enriches mind and body, each gratifies the most refined tastes, each becomes a passion unless the pursuer guard his enthusiasm and moderate his desires.

It is nothing strange that men who throw their flies for trout should dream of it.

As long ago as when Theocritus wrote his Idyls, men who caught fish dreamed of their sport or work, whichev- er it was. It can not, indeed, be said that the Greek fish- erman dreamed of the mere excitement of fishing, for to him the sea was a place of toil, and his poor hut was but a miserable hovel. He fished for its reward in gold ; and he dreamed that he took a fish of gold, w^hose value would relieve him from the pains and toils of his life, and when he was awake he feared that he had bound himself by an oath in his dream, and his wise companion — philosopher then, as all anglers were, and are, and will be evermore — relieved him by a brief sermon, wherein lies a moral. Look it up, and read it. What angler does not dream of great fish rising with heavy roll and plunge to seize the fly ? What dreams those are !

Is there any thing strange, then, in the question wheth- er Peter in his slumber never dreamed of the great fish in the Sea of Galilee, or the gentle John, in his old age and weary longing for the end, did not sometimes recall in sleep other and more earthly scenes than the sub- lime visions of inspiration ? Do you doubt — I do not —

CHRISTOPHER NORTH. 1 5

that his great soul, over which had swept floods of emo- tion such as few other human souls have ever experi- enced, was yet so fresh and young, even in the days of rock-bound Patmos, and long after at Ephesus, when he counted a hundred years of life, that in sleep he some- times sat in his boat, rocked by the waves of the blue Gennesaret, his black locks shaking in the breeze that came down from Hermon, his eyes wandering from Ta- bor to Gilboa, from Gilboa to Lebanon, from Lebanon to the wild hills of the Gadarenes, while he caught the shy but beautiful fish that were born in the Jordan, and lived in the waters that were by Capernaum and Bethsaida ?

To you, my friend, who know nothing of the gentle and purifying associations of the angler's life, these may seem strange notions — to some, indeed, they may even sound profane. But the angler for whom I write will not so think them, nor may I, who, thinking these same thoughts, have cast my line on the Sea of Galilee, and taken the descendants of old fish in the swift waters of the Jordan.

Trout-fishing is employment for all men, of all minds. It tends to dreamy life, and it leads to much thought and reflection. I do not know in any book or story of mod- ern times a more touching and exquisite scene than that which Mrs. Gordon gives in her admirable biography of her father, the leonine Christopher North, when the fee- ble old man waved his rod for the last time over the Doc- hart, where he had taken trout from his boyhood. Shall we ever look upon his like again ? He was a giant among men of intellectual greatness. Of all anglers since apostolic days, he was the greatest ; and there is no angler who does not look to him with veneration and love, while the English language will forever possess higher value that he has lived and written. It would be

l6 I GO A-FISHING.

thought very strange were one to say that Wilson would never have been half the man he was were he not an angler. But he would have said so himself, and I am not sure but he did say so, and, whether he did or not, I have no doubt of the truth of the saying.

It has happened to me to fish the Dochart from the old inn at Luib down to the bridge, and the form of the great Christopher was forever before me along the bank and in the rapids, making his last casts as Mrs. Gordon here so tenderly describes him :

" Had my father been able to endure the fatigue, we too would have had something to boast of; but he was unable to do more than loiter by the river-side close in the neighborhood of the inn — never without his rod. * * * How now do his feet touch the heather? Not as of old with a bound, but with slow and unsteady step, supported on the one hand by his stick, while the other carries his rod. The breeze gently moves his locks, no longer glit- tering with the light of life, but dimmed by its decay. Yet are his shoulders broad and unbent. The lion-like presence is somewhat softened down, but not gone. He surely will not venture into the deeps of the water, for only one hand is free for ' a cast,' and those large stones, now slippery with moss, are dangerous stumbling-blocks in the way. Besides, he promised his daughters he would not wade, but, on the contrary, walk quietly with them by the river's edge, there gliding ' at its own sweet will.' Silvery bands of pebbled shore leading to loamy- colored pools, dark as the glow of a southern eye, how could he resist the temptation of near approach ? In he goes, up to the ankles, then to the knees, tottering every other step, but never falling. Trout after trout he catch- es, small ones certainly, but plenty of them. Into his pocket with them, all this time manoeuvring in the most skillful manner both stick and rod : until weary, he is obliged to rest on the bank, sitting with his feet in the water, laughing at his daughters' horror, and obstinately

CHRISTOPHER NORTH. 1 7

continuing the sport in spite of all remonstrance. At last he gives in and retires. Wonderful to say, he did not seem to suffer from these imprudent liberties."

And Mrs. Gordon gives us another exquisite picture in the very last days of the grand old Christopher :

* * * " And then he gathered around him, when the spring mornings brought gay jets of sunshine into the little room where he lay, the relics of a youthful passion, one that with him never grew old. It was an affecting sight to see him busy, nay, quite absorbed with the fish- ing-tackle scattered about his bed, propped up with pil- lows— his noble head, yet glorious with its flowing locks, carefully combed by attentive hands, and falling on each side of his unfaded face. How neatly he picked out each elegantly dressed fly from its little bunch, drawing it out with trembling hand along the white coverlet, and then, replacing it in his pocket-book, he would tell ever and anon of the streams he used to fish in of old, and of the deeds he had performed in his childhood and youth."

There is no angler who will not appreciate the beauty of these pictures, and I do not believe any one of us, re- taining his mental faculties, will fail in extremest age to recall with the keenest enjoyment of which memory is capable the scenes of our happiest sport.

Was Peter less or more than man ? Was John not of like passions with ourselves ? Believe me, the old dweller on Patmos, the old Bishop of Ephesus, lingering between the memories of his Lord in Galilee and the longing for him to come quickly yet again, saw often before his dim eyes the ripple on Gennesaret, and the flashing scales of the silver fish that had gladdened him many a time be- fore he knew the Master.

I have sometimes thought it more than possible that the young son of Joseph and Mary knew the Galilee fish-

B

l8 I GO A-FISHING.

ermen before he called them to be his apostles. There is nothing to forbid, but much to fortify the idea in the account which Luke gives us of his entering into the ship of Simon, and asking him to push off from the shore while he taught the people ; and still more in the subse- quent incidents, when, like one who had often been with them before, he told Simon to go out into deep water and cast for fish. He may indeed have been a stran- ger, who impressed Simon now for the first time with his noble presence, and won him by his eloquent teachings, but I incline to the thought that this was far from the first meeting of Jesus of Nazareth with the fishermen of Gennesaret. Nazareth was not far away from the sea. I remember a morning's walk from the village to the sum- mit of Tabor, whence I first saw the blue beauty of that lake of holy memory. How his childhood and youth were passed we know not ; but that he wandered over the hills, and walked down to the lake shore, and min- gled more or less with the people among whom his life went peacefully on until he entered upon his public mis- sion, can not be doubted.

It is one of the most pleasant and absorbing thoughts which possess the traveler in those regions, that the child Christ was a child among the hills of Galilee, and loved them with all the gentle fervor of his human soul. Doubt- less many times before he had challenged the fisher on the sea with that same question which we anglers so fre- quently hear, " Have you taken any fish ?" He may have often seen Peter and the others at their work. Perhaps sometimes he had talked with them, and, it may well be, gone with them on the sea, and helped them. For they were kindly men, as fishermen are always in all countries, and they loved to talk of their work, and of a thousand

APOSTOLIC FISHERMEN. I9

Other things of which, in their contemplative lives, they had thought without talking.

In an age when few men were learned, and, in fact, few in any grade or walk of life could even read or write, 1 am inclined to think there was no class from whom better trained intellects could be selected than from among these thoughtful fishermen. They had doubtless the Oriental characteristics of calmness and reserve, and these had been somewhat modified by their employment. Given to sober reflection, patient to investigate, quick to trust when their faith was demanded by one whom they respected, slow to act when haste was not necessary, prompt and swift on any emergency, filled full of love for nature, all harsh elements of character softened into a deep benevolence and pity and love — such are the fishermen of our day, and such, I doubt not, were the fishermen of old. They were men with whom a mother would willingly trust her young boy, to whom he would become attached, with whom he would enjoy talking, and, above all, who would pour out their very souls in talking with him, when among their fellow- men they would be reserved, diffident, and silent. They were men, too, who would recognize in the boy the greatness of his lineage, the divine shining out from his eyes. Who shall prevail to imagine the pleasantness of those days on the sea when Peter and John talked with the holy boy, as they waited for the fish, and their boat rocked to the winds that came down from Lebanon. Who can say that there were not some memories of those days, as well as of the others when we know Christ was with him, which, when he was tired of the waiting, led Peter to say, " I go a-fishing."

I believe that he went a-fishing because he felt exactly

20 I GO A-FISHING.

as I have felt, exactly as scores of men have felt wh-o knew the charm of the gentle art, as we now call it. No other has such attraction. Men love hunting, love boat- ing, love games of varied sorts, love many amusements of many kinds, but I do not know of any like fishing to which men go for relief in weariness, for rest after labor, for solace in sorrow. I can well understand how those sad men, not yet fully appreciating the grand truth that their Master had risen from the dead, believing, yet doubting, how even Thomas, who had so lately seen the wounds and heard the voice, how even John, loving and loved, who had rejoiced a week ago in Jerusalem at the presence of the triumphant Lord, how Peter, always fear- ful, how Nathanael, full of impulsive faith, how each and all of them, wearied with their long waiting for him on the shore of the sea, sought comfort and solace, oppor- tunity and incitement to thought in going a-fishing.

I can understand it, for, though far be it from me to compare any weariness or sorrow of mine with theirs, I have known that there was no better way in which I could find rest. And I have gathered together the chapters of this book, if perchance it may serve as a companion to any one who would go a-fishing if he could, but can not, or help another who has gone a-fishing to enjoy the rest which he has thus obtained. I have written for lovers of the gentle art, and if this which I have written fall into other hands, let him who reads understand that it is not for him. We who go a-fishing are a peculiar people. Like other men and women in many respects, we are like one another, and like no others, in other respects. We understand each other's thoughts by an intuition of which you know nothing. We cast our flies on many waters, where memories and fancies and facts rise, and we take

anglers' peculiarities. 21

ihem and show them to each other, and, small or large, we are content with our catch. So closely are we alike in some regards, so different from the rest of the world in these respects, and so important are these characteristics of mind and of thought, that I sometimes think no man but one of us can properly understand the mind of Peter, or appreciate the glorious visions of the son of Zebedee.

II.

AT THE ROOKERY.

It can not be supposed that one who has not been ac- customed to it should find that refreshment in going a-fishing which is so welcome to him who knows it by old experience ; yet it is a habit of body and mind easily cultivated, and much to be commended. Every hard- working man should have a hobby. This is sound doc- trine. Especially should the professional man and the active business man remember this. He whose mind is occupied during the day with severe labor will find it im- possible at evening to abandon his work. The responsi- bilities of the day will weigh on him at night ; he can not rid himself of them. Social enjoyment, conversation, or- dinary amusement, and recreation will serve but a tem- porary purpose, and can not be relied on to divert the mind from anxiety and care. Try the experiment. Take to collecting engravings or coins or shells, or any thing else, so it be a subject to interest you, and make a hobby of it. It will absorb the mind, enable it to throw off all business thought, afford sensible relief and refreshment, and be a great insurance against those diseases of the brain which close the labors and usefulness of so many strong intellects.

The summer vacation, which is about the only recre- ation that an American professional or business man

AT THE ROOKERY. 23

allows himself, is apt to be wasted entirely by the want of mental refreshment which can not be found in the ordi- nary resorts of summer pleasure-seekers. The vacation does little good to him who carries his business on his brain ; and it too frequently happens that men go to places where they have no resort for amusement except to the newspapers and the business talk of other weary men like themselves. It is not every man who should go a-fishing, but there are many who would find this their true rest and recreation of body and mind. And having, either in boyhood or in later life, learned by experience how pleasant it is to go a-fishing, you will find, as Peter found, that you are drawn to it whenever you are weary, impatient, or sad.

In every opening spring anglers feel the longing for the country and the trout streams. It is something more than longing, it is an essential — the necessity of going a- fishing — a necessity which the angler well appreciates, but which may seem inexplicable to him who has no love for the gentle art. In the cold days and nights of winter the love of the streams and lakes is intense enough, but it is not active — it is not a propelling motive. It is delicious to remember the last year's enjoyment, to recall the mu- sic of waters which have long ago run to the seas ; of trees shaken by winds that have died to rest. Ah ! the delight of such recollections !

They are like attendant spirits, dwelling in our city houses, making themselves known only in the evening, when the firelight shines into unfathomed distances. Many an evening in the winter they talk to me as I sit by the library fire, and it is quaint and queer to hear them talk, and very pleasant withal. There are two pictures on the wall which seem to be the resting-places of two op-

24 I GO A-FISHING.

posing tribes of spirits. On the one side a grand old piece of flesh representing Paul, the first hermit, by Ribe- ra, and on the other side a Flora, by an unknown artist, very beautiful and very breezy, with flowers abundant, the very light of spring beaming out of her eyes. In Novem- ber and December the Spagnoletto has the advantage. The dark but loving old eyes, the massive yet delicate features, the profound expression of devotion, all seem in keeping with the winter, and with one's own humor. It indeed speaks of the country, but of the desert of the Thebaid, where among rocks and yellow sand the raven fed the saint, and Anthony found and buried him. So, as the evenings pass, one may read or work, looking up at the hermit's face, and catching now and then an inspira- tion like that of the old ages, breathing in the atmosphere of the early times. But as March passes into April, and April yields to May, Flora grows glorious in her beauty, and laughs triumphantly across at Paul, who has kept her quiet for so long. Now she wields her power. Every look out of her eyes is a command — " Meet me in the up- country." It is astonishing, the manner in w^hich these two pictures keep up this annual contest, and it has been so often repeated that they now seem to take it as a mat- ter of course, and each keeps within its own domain of time. Is the secret in the pictures, or in the man who in- habits the room ?

If the angler be not impelled by the command of a visible queen of May, he always feels the unconquerable necessity of going a-fishing when the spring comes. It can't be resisted. He might as well try to shake off the impulse of waking up in the morning, and resolve to sleep on forever. Thus it happened that I was driven ofl", drawn off, tempted off, call it what you will, to visit an old

THE ROOKERY. 25

friend whose home in the country has been a home for a few lovers of him and of trout these many years. It is a spot like which there are not many — of exceeding beau- ty and attractiveness. The winds sigh as they pass over it, because they can not pause and sleep as I do there. The hemlocks on the mountain bend down toward it, longing for that far day when they shall fall and rest on the hill-side, and that more distant day when, dust of the earth, they shall be brought by gentle rains down to the depths of the valley, and find the calm that is so undis- turbed and perfect.

Many years ago, my friend discovered the spot and in- habited it. It had been for a long time previous almost a wilderness, though across the mountain, a few miles off, was a fine farming country. The Rookery took its name from an old log house which at first satisfied the wants of an angler coming here only to pass a few da3^s or weeks in quiet sport. But a frame house grew against the log house, and then a large and roomy stone house, with abundance of places for friends ; and then, as he loved the spot more and more for its associations, he filled it with furniture, and brought his library from his city house, and began to live here nine months of the year. The glen became a very paradise. The bottom-land, when cleared and drained, was a rich farm ; and a few houses for his workmen made a settlement in the heart of the forest. Then civilization approached in the shape of a railroad, with a station two miles off, and the inevitable law of human weakness introduced luxury into this once remote forest home in the shape of regular newspapers — the morning papers of the city — fortunately cooled off from their city heat and impetuosity of thought and ex- pression by a long day's ride on the rail before they reach

26 I GO A-FISHING.

the Rookery. Still, this is a forest home. The acres, which count by the thousand, include mountains and lakes, and you must drive a long way from the house be- fore you strike on any sign of other human residence.

Just in front of the house the mountains open in a ra- vine, and down this comes a noble stream, wherein the trout lie cool and quiet. Over the hill, in the winds of September, the fat deer snuff the birch breezes, and come sauntering down to the copse behind the gardens, where they sometimes startle little El lie, the gardener's daugh- ter, who runs in with brown eyes wide open, and tells of the flashing eyes and lofty antlers that scared her as she stood at the little swinging gate.

I can not linger on these descriptions. You have heard of such spots — dreamed of them. Some day, " if you are good, and deserve it," as Ellie saith, I will bring you here, where I found a company of old friends, and where, with John Steenburger, the traveler, and John Johnston, the clergyman, and others, old friends of Philip Alexan- der, our host, I have let many a blessed month of May die and be carried away by the breath of June without lament- ing it. There has been other pleasant company there that will not be there again, and that recollection gives us all a love for the old place.

The night had been cool and delightful We had slept the sleep of the innocent, but the Doctor roused me by stumbling into my room before daybreak and lighting a candle, wherewith he found my fly-book, and then sat down to examine it. When, at last, I persuaded myself to open my eyes, it was to see him at work by the candle- light, dressing a fly for the benefit of the fish that he had seen yesterday in a deep hole a mile up the glen. As he worked he sang, changing the tune and time occasion-

DOCTOR JOHNSTON. 27

ally, for now it was a bit of a psalm and a psalm tune, and now it was the fag end of an unholy opera air that he enunciated, and, as he finished the fly, he brought out a profound bass "/« secula secidoricm^^ that would have done credit to the celebrated throat which makes music in St. Roche on feast days.

For the Doctor, be it known to you, has a taste for mu- sic, and an ear for all beautiful sounds, even as Squire John — that is, John Steenburger, the traveler — has for all beautiful sights. Hence the Doctor will pause sometimes and listen to the melody of wind and water among the hills, and say " Beautiful ;" and the Squire will think he speaks of the view, which is pre-eminently bad at the mo- ment, and the result is generally what would be called a discussion elsewhere, but what we call a row between the two Johns.

" A — men !" sang the Squire from his room opening into mine, as he heard the Doctor's finale. " I say, Ef- fendi, what is the Doctor at in your quarters ?"

"Setting snares for the unwary. Rising up early to entrap innocence. The man of blood is arming himself and sharpening his weapons."

" Come, come. None of your nonsense, you two. Let us be off early."

" Why, Doctor, the trout haven't had their breakfasts yet. You wouldn't — "

"Wouldn't I?" And I left my bed on one side as a ewer of water came into it on the other from the unmer- ciful hands of the churchman, who claims to be the com- mander-in-chief of our small party, and exercises a most tyrannous rule over us.

A cup of coffee was ready in the breakfast-room, where Philip joined us. The dim morning light was not suffi-

28 I GO A- FISHING.

cient to make visible the ebony face of Simon ; but his teeth reflected the dawn as he let us out at the front door of the old kitchen, and we strode off into the twilight of the park and the forest.

Half an hour's walk brought us to the bank of the stream, two miles up the glen. We proposed to whip it down to the house, for it crossed the road fifty rods from the end of the mansion.

The Doctor walked ahead, talking vehemently.

The sun was rising as we reached the water, and the first ray fell on the ripple with the white fly of the Doc- tor's morning work.

I appreciate wholly your exclamation, my good friend, when you read of a white fly on running water at sunrise of a clear day. It does not seem right to you. In point of fact, it seems absurd, and you begin to doubt at once whether the Doctor knew any thing about fishing. Trust him for that. He knows more about it than you'or I will ever learn. For trout-fishing is an art which can never be learned from books, and which experience alone will teach.

It is noteworthy, and has doubtless often attracted the attention of anglers, that different books give totally dif- ferent instructions and information about the same fish. This is easily explained. Most of the writers on angling have written from experience obtained in certain waters. One who has taken trout for a score of years in the St. Regis waters forms his opinion of these fish from their habits in those regions. But a St. Regis trout is no more like a Welokennebacook trout in his habits than a Boston gentleman is like a New-Yorker. Who would think of describing the habits and customs of mankind from a knowledge of the Englishman ? Yet we have abundance

HABITS OF TROUT. 29

of book-lore on the habits of fish, founded on acquaint- ance with the fish in one or another locality. To say truth, until one has studied the habits of trout in all the waters of the world, it is unsafe for him to venture any general account of those habits.

Take the simplest illustration. If you are on the lower St. Regis, and seek large trout, rise before the sun, and cast for the half-hour preceding and the hour following sunrise. You will find the fish plenty and voracious, striking with vigor, and evidently on the feed. But go to Profile Lake (that gem of all the world of waters), wherein I have taken many thousand trout, and you will scarcely ever have a rise in the morning. In the one lake the fish are in the habit of feeding at day-dawn. In the other no trout breakfasts till nine o'clock, unless, like the depart- ing guests in the neighboring hotel, business or pleasure lead him to be up for once at an early hour.

So, too, you may cast on Profile Lake at noon in the sunshine, and, as in most waters, though the trout are abundant, they will not be tempted to rise. But in Echo Lake, only a half-mile distant, where trout are scarce, I have killed many fish of two and three pounds' weight, and nearly all between eleven and one o'clock in bright sunshiny weather. In fact, when they rise at all on Echo Lake, it is almost invariably at that hour, and very seldom at any other. Men have their hours of eating, settled into what w^e call habits. The Bostonian dines at one hour, the New-Yorker at another. One should not attempt to describe the eating habits of man in general from either class, or from both. In many respects the habits of fish are formed, as are the habits of men, by the force of cir- cumstances, or by the influence of the imitative propensity. They do some things only because they have seen other

30 I GO A -FISHING.

fish do so. Instinct leads them to some habits, education to others.

Now to return to the white fly. The discussion is quite vain, into which so many fishermen have gone, on the question whether the artificial fly is to be used on the im- itation theory. Trout take some flies because they resem- ble the real fly on which they feed. They take other flies for no such reason. And in this they are like men. If you have entered a restaurant to dine, having made up your mind to eat roast beef, you will not be moved by any eloquence of the waiter who recommends the mutton or the turkey, or any number of other dishes. Roast beef you want, and you will have it. So, when trout are feed- ing on a particular fly, and have their appetites set upon it, you will see them rising every where to take that fly, and you can not coax them to touch one of all that you are able to ofler them unless you happen to have an imi- tation of that bo?me bouche. Yet it may occur that one or another trout has no such set appetite, and once in a while such a rover will take your offer of almost any thing.

The Doctor had his reasons therefore for dressing a white fly. If I were compelled to give a theory on the subject, I should refer to my experience. I have fre- quently killed trout in swift water with a white fly at midday, and I think the trout takes it for a fish and not a fly ; for I have observed that he generally seizes it with open mouth on a sharp rush, and does not strike it first with his tail, as he does usually in taking a fly.

The white fly raised a pound fish, and the doctor landed him after a brief run. Then another not so large, and then a half dozen smaller fish. So his theory was sustained.

We worked diligently for half an hour down the bank,

A FINE TROUT. 3 1

till we approached the spot which our friend had in his mind. We took an excellent run of trout all along. I think the morning's work was better than usual, and our spirits rose as we strolled through the grand old forest. The river was full of music, the rush of every rapid was loud and clear and ringing. The sharp cry of the wood- pecker sounded shrill across the valley, while an occa- sional partridge that we put up here and there went off with a buzzing, thunderous flight that was altogether use- less under the circumstances, for it was May, and we carried only rods.

" Ha ! I have him now," said the Doctor, suddenly, as he struck a fine trout.

He was a pretty specimen, but I had seen a larger one rise at the same fly, and, when he missed it, turn down toward the eddy under a rock in the middle of the stream. Philip saw him too.

"My head against your wig he kills the largest fish of the day within ten minutes, Doctor."

" I wear my own hair, Philip, as I have before re- marked to you."

I had him ; my reel flew around with a sharp whirr as he went down stream.

The Doctor looked on with disappointment in his whole countenance. It was the very trout for whose de- lectation he had tied that fly.

The bend of the rod, the gentle feeling with the finger as I checked the run of the line, told his weight almost as accurately as a spring scale. Don't imagine always that anglers have no authority for their figures when they tell of large fish that they have struck and lost. I know men who are accustomed to tell the weight of their fish before they have seen them above water, and who

32 I GO A -FISHING.

will hit it correctly within an ounce or two nine times out of ten ; for the angler knows his rod, and it grows to his hand like a part of it, so that he feels the fish on it as if he were in his very grasp.

He went down stream thirty yards, and then yielded to the pressure and swung across the current. Just for a moment it seemed as if he would try it again down the current, and, if so, I must follow him, for I had only ten yards of line left on the reel. But the hook held well, and the angry fish began a series of rushes from one side of the stream to the other, back and across, again and again, darting like an arrow, as if at each rush he would go high out on the land, but turning with incon- ceivable swiftness at each bank. Then suddenly, and in a st3^1e wholly uncommon with the brook trout, he started down stream, over a low fall and into a deep hole, where he sulked like a salmon.

The Doctor had watched me with intense anxiety — so intense that he forgot his own line and fly, and stood with his mouth and eyes wide open as the reel flew around with its shrill noise. He uttered an ejaculation of satisfaction when the sound ceased, and now accom- panied me as I made my way down the bank, slowly winding in the slack of the line without disturbing the gentleman who had hold of the other end.

" Easy, easy, now; don't hurry yourself, boy."

" Be quiet, Doctor ; your pulpit voice and declamatory style will stir up his friend down there. Do be quiet."

" Hum. You're impertinent, Philip ; and, besides that, you know as well as I that fish can't hear. That's set- tled now beyond a question."

" I say, Effendi, just give the Doctor your rod. He'll not be content till he has it in his own hands."

THE doctor's plunge. 33

" He can't have it, John."

We were now close over the deep hole. The stream was here some forty feet across, and took a short turn to the westward ; the result was a deep undermining of the left bank. Close to the edge was the stump of a large tree ; the roots went into the water in a dozen strange twists and curves. But they prevented the fur- ther washing away of the bank, and the result was a deep hole, in which the trout found refuge.

" Wait, just one second, till I look over !" said the Doc- tor; and, dropping on his hands and knees, he crept to the edge of the overhanging bank, and leaned as far over the water as his neck and arms would allow. The view of the somewhat ponderous body of the learned fisher- man, in this peculiar posture, was not a little picturesque ; but how much more so was it when the edge of the bank suddenly gave way, and the descending head of the Doc- tor vanished and his feet followed with a celerity that was most remarkable. A guttural " Phil — up — up — puh '" — a tremendous splash, a white foam flying into the air — and it was all over.

Perhaps you think we rushed to the rescue. We did no such thing. We sat down on the ground and shouted ; we rolled among the dead leaves and rent the air with our shrieks. When we could speak we thought of the Doctor's probable fate, and then looked toward the water for the first time.

There was his face — ghastly and alarmingly severe. He had one of the roots in both hands. It was pretty far under water, and required a severe stretch for him to keep his chin above. This he had accomplished ; but he could not raise his eyes to the level of the bank, and could only gather from our shouts in what way we were

C

34

I GO A- FISHING.

occupied. When he was fairly out and on the bank he was a subject for an artist.

But I landed my fish. He of course left when the Doctor plunged, and, crossing the basin, had doubtless been in a state of astonishment at all the events of the morning. He had not gotten rid of the hook ; and when I picked up my rod I felt him there, and soon brought him to the landing-net, three pounds and three quarters plump, as noble a fish as one could desire.

The Doctor was not the man to give up a morning's sport for a wetting, and, when we had with some difficulty negotiated a treaty of peace, after what he called our gross treason and abominable treatment of him, we sauntered on down the stream, and filled our baskets with fine specimens.

We had a late breakfast, and a bountiful one, at the Rookery. Nothing goes more to the heart of a fisherman than a good cup of coffee, and this, if he is knowing, he will manage to have almost every where. In Philip's house it is so regularly good that it would doubtless make itself of a morning in perfection if there were no cook. Making good coffee is fast getting to be one of the lost arts. Certainly one meets it now very seldom in Amer- ica, and still more seldom in Europe. Traveling in our own country, at hotels, railway stations, and even in pri- vate houses, the stuff called coffee is a vile, wishywashy drink, worse than warm water. There is no excuse for this when good coffee is so easily made. The rule is as simple as possible. First buy good coffee. If your sense of smell is not educated to accomplish the purchase with judgment, get some one who can smell to buy it for you. Roast it brown. Then take a half-pint of ground coffee, break an egg in it, pour on three half-pints of cold water,

COFFEE. 35

and set it on the fire. No matter whether it is in an open tin pan or a close coffee-pot. Don't let it boil three sec- onds. The instant it foams up your coffee is ready. Pour it through a cloth strainer, and to a fourth of a cupful of the coffee add three fourths of hot milk. Via tout. You have a cup of aromatic bliss. Old fishermen know all about this, and in forest life have better coffee in camp than can be had at the Cafe Foi in Paris.

For the Parisian cafe is not what it used to be. A cup of coffee has not been attainable for years past in Paris, except in the lowest-class restaurants. If you seek it, go to the environs of a market — the little Marche St. Hono- ree, for example — and in one of the miserable shops where the market people get their early breakfasts, you may find, what you used to find in every restaurant, a good bowl of cafi-au-lait.

A cup of coffee is full of refreshing memories. The sense which more than all others recalls old scenes is the sense of smell. Odors, good or bad, are quick reminders. Neither hearing nor sight nor touch nor taste has half the power to recall the vanished past.

" Effendi," said Philip, before he lifted the coffee to his lips at breakfast that morning, " what has become of our old friend Abd-el-Kader, who was Nadir in Upper Egypt when I met you at Thebes in fifty-six .?"

" What, in the name of wonder, has started such an in- quiry ?" said Dr. Johnston, looking curiously at Philip.

" I'm sure I don't know. Is there any thing odd about my question .?"

" Nothing odd ; only remarkably remote from any thing hereabouts."

" Not so," I said. " It was the coffee. The only time that Philip and I met in Egypt was at Edfou, one after-

36 1 GO A -FISHING.

noon when Abd-el-Kader was holding his appellate court under a tree on the bank of the Nile, and we drank cof- fee and smoked latakia with him for an hour before he came down to my boat. His coffee was the best of Mocha, and this has Mocha in it, eh, Philip ?"

" Right. It is half Mocha and half old Java. I learned the mixture once at Aden, and have always kept it up."

" How happened it that you and the Effendi met in the East, Philip } I never heard that you were a traveler."

" It's a long story."

" All the better ; let us have it."

" Not just now," said Philip, with a somewhat sad smile, turning to me a wistful sort of look, as if he were half inclined to tell the story. Thereby I knew, what 1 had long suspected, that my friend had some secret in his breast which might with relief to him be imparted to oth- ers; for I had only known him twenty years or so, and mostly as a fisherman, and he was one of the sort who wins one's heart. He was a man of rare accomplish- ments, much older than I, yet with a vigorous frame. So I said quietly, " Let us go a-fishing this afternoon, and perhaps this evening Philip will tell us the story."

So we w^ent out that evening under the great trees, and walked and talked and fished, and fished and talked and walked ; and when the dark came down on us, and John was speaking of something that happened to him in Jeru- salem, our friend turned to me, and spoke in a soft, gut- tural Arabic —

" Effendi, shall I tell my story ?"

" Is it peace ?"

" It is peace."

"Good. Say on, Iskander Effendi."

III.

ISKANDER EFFENDI.

" It is somewhat strange that you people have known nie so long and have known so little about me. But that is the way of the world. I have had nothing to conceal, and it only happens that you never before put the ques- tion to me plainly, 'Have you a story to tell.?' Every one of you, doubtless, could tell a personal history fully as strange as mine, for there is a vast deal of romance in the most ordinary lives, and there is no man or woman in the most quiet country place in America whose life has not been marked by one or another event which has in it all the elements of what we call the romantic. These events may have occurred in the old farm-house, in the village home, in the brown-stone city house, or — as mine — in dis- tant countries. My story, stripped of the local interests which make it seem strange to American life, is a very common story; but I confess that sometimes when I am leading this calm and delicious existence of ours in the Rookery, I have hard work to realize my personal identity with the man whom you, I think, will be surprised to hear was once Iskander Effendi, merchant in Jerusalem. You know that I am a Hebrew by birth. My father's family had lived in England, and he came thence to New York, bringing with him all his property. I was brought up as an only child. Educated with care and expense, sent

38 I GO A- FISHING.

abroad to travel, and indoctrinated thoroughly into the re- ligious faith of my ancestors.

" I was not given to associating with others of my age and station, and I passed with such as a somewhat mo- rose boy. Yet with books and paintings I made life pass on quietly enough, and so I might have lived perhaps till I grew old had I not seen and loved a woman.

" You will not care to know where or how I first saw

Edith . Some of you remember her. It was the

one grand secret of my life. I was a young man of ar- dent affections, hopeful, cheerful, and I believe I could have made her a happy wife. She was very beautiful, and they said very gentle and good, and I saw her and I loved her.

" But I never knew her for years. You start. Was it strange that I, a Jew, of the race of the despised, should have shrunk from exposing myself to her contempt ? No. I never approached her — never spoke a word to her. Why should I lose the glory of my dream by subjecting myself to her pity or her scorn. Why should I risk losing the blessedness of loving her by hearing that she had called me Alexander the Jew?

" She was the daughter of wealthy parents. Her posi- tion was undoubted. Her circle was not mine, though my father's wealth was tenfold that of hers. Though we were admitted into all the houses of the wealthy and aris- tocratic in America, still we were Jews; and I would not have approached that fair girl and subjected myself to the glance of her pitying eye for all the wealth of Solomon. She was very young, not eighteen, but a perfect woman ; and I worshiped her at a distance — how sincerely ! with what depth of devotion ! Once, and but once, I was near her; for, passing down a New York street one dark

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 39

night, in front of her father's door, I saw her carriage draw up at the curb, and she descended from it with her mother. Just as they stepped out two ruffians set upon them, and the elder lady shrieked and fell, while Edith sprang proudly back to the side of the carriage, and raised her slender arm and fan as if she carried a sword. It was but the work of a second to send the villains one into the gutter and one half dead against an iron fence. Then I left them, unthanked — for I did not wish to be recog- nized and remembered. Can you imagine this strange feeling ? It was my life. It led my every-day existence. For this thought and this only I lived — that I should love that beautiful girl, and love her unknown forever.

" My father died, leaving me wealthy and alone in the world. The life I had led had wholly separated me from men. I was utterly alone. My father's loss was not felt, for I had never loved him. Yet there was a strange in- cident in his death which impressed me. He died sud- denly, and his last words were very few. ^Philip — you are alone — lonesome — my son, you have kindred that you know not of — Jerusalem — seek — father's — son — broth- er— ' These broken words were his last utterance.

" I had passed four years of my life in the East with a tutor. I know not what longing after human affection sent me on the search that was pointed out in my father's last words. I gathered that I had kindred somewhere, and perhaps he meant to say he or his father had a brother of whom I would hear something in Jerusalem.

" I had nothing to live for in America but Edith — and just then Edith was gone. Her mother died, and her fa- ther took her away to Europe, and for long travel.

" I went to seek some one I could love, and that would love me. It was a boyish fancy, perhaps, but I sought it

40 I GO A -FISHING.

the world over. In Jerusalem I learned nothing. Then 1 came back to England, and sought the old branches of the family, but they had gone long ago to Madrid. At Madrid I found no traces of them ; but I went thence to Tunis, and, after living a year in the latter city of living Arabs and dead men's bones, I went by way of the coast with a Mograbbin caravan to Cairo and Suez, and down the Red Sea to Aden.

" But why relate further my wanderings. For three years I sought kindred — any thing possessing my blood — but without success ; and I returned at last to Jerusalem, where I resolved to live and die. More than two years I had been in the Holy City without setting foot within the Christian's great temple, when one morning the Padre Antonio, desiring to purchase of me a rare piece of bro- cade for an ornamental use in the Latin chapel, took me with him to see the spot. I was dealing in silks and jew- els then by way of amusement, for I was a lonesome man in my habits at Jerusalem, as I had been in America. The padre left me alone in the rotunda of the church.

" I was standing on the Latin side of the Holy Sepul- chre, just under the dome, close by the entrance to the chapel of the angel. It was almost noon. In ten min- utes, at the most, we would hear the thundering clatter on the board at the door which implies that the Turk who sits in state at the grand entrance is about to go to his noonday meal, and the great church is to be closed until the hour of vespers.

"Here and there around the sacred centre were devo- tees kneeling in prayer. On the Moor's side an old black man — looking, in the face, the very image of my grandfather's servant, Neptune, but in dress very different — was kneeling at the edge of the inclosing wall of the

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 4I

sepulchre, with his head thrown back, and his face up- turned to the blue and serene sky that shone over the open dome. As I looked at him, I for the moment for- got the place in which I was, and remembered the scenes of a long-gone and, perhaps I should add, a long-forgot- ten boyhood.

" I could not, without some awe and reverence, stand on the spot that had received so many bended knees and penitential tears for fifteen centuries ; and, while that feel- ing of awe and reverence was taking possession of me, I caught sight of the face of the kneeling Moor, and the memory of my old home in America came over me with a gush of tenderness, and I felt the tears on my cheek, and wiped them away with the silken sleeve of my caftan.

"Just at that moment I was aware of another person kneeling close by my side. This was a female, but her face was not visible. She was dressed in the Arab cos- tume, and that of the poorer class. A long blue cotton gown, without belt, fell from her shoulders, and covered her kneeling form ; a head-dress of the same blue stuff — which you, perhaps, might call a veil — was over her head, and drawn tight around her face. I supposed her to be a Christian woman of the city, or possibly from Jaf- fa or Kafr-el-Eniab, and I would have taken no further notice of her but for the convulsive sobs which shook her frame, and which now became painfully audible.

"The monks and others around paid no attention to this. I afterward learned to know that such sobs and ev- idences- of agony are too common just there to attract the attention of any frequenter of the place. Daily many hundreds, w^omen mostly, kneel weeping there, as daily for a thousand years pilgrims have knelt and wept. But I was a stranger, and I did not understand that the

42 I GO A-FISHING.

Christian women were moved there very much as our Is- raelitish old men are moved at the great temple stones where every Friday they meet to pray and lament.

So I looked at her more earnestly, and, as she sobbed more and more, she slightly displaced the cotton garment that covered her head and neck, and, standing as I did just above her, I saw that she was no Arab woman. Her neck was white ; her hair was bound in a knot with a chain of gold that flashed among the tresses which hung from the bright loop.

"'This,' I said, 'is no Arab worman. Is she, perhaps, Georgian or Circassian .? But, if so, what does she here in the church of Christ's resurrection ? For the Georgi- ans and Circassians are mostly in Turkish harems. Per- haps, then, she is Greek. But why the disguise ? This cotton robe is not worn for humility, since it is but the covering, and not the substitute for splendor.'

"And as I stood thus thinking, the thunder of the rap- ping on the board at the door resounded through the building, and the hundreds of monks, attendants, visitors, penitents, and beggars rushed in a mass to the stone of unction and the great doorway.

" The praying woman by my side rose slowly to her feet and threw back the veil which she had kept pressed against her face. She did not entirely expose her coun- tenance, and I could only catch the outline of a rosy cheek and the edge of a rounded chin. The act was hasty, as if she was oppressed for breath ; for, as she did it, a labored sigh as of pent-up grief escaped her lips, and she murmured audibly, ' To-morrow — to-morrow — al- ways to-morrow.'

" As she spoke, she seemed suddenly aware of my pres- ence, and the veil fell over her face.

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 43

"I had heard her speak four words in good English; for there was no mistaking that Enghsh word to-morrow for any guttural Arabic word.

" It was none of my business — this woman's grief, or her nationality. Had I met her in the streets of New York or London, or even in Paris or Berlin, and she had said, 'To-morrow — to-morrow — always to-morrow,' I w^ould probably have passed on and forgot her.

" But to see the outline of such a face under an Arab yasmak, and to hear such a voice in English accents utter those words in Jerusalem by the Holy Sepulchre, was another sort of matter, and I might well be aston- ished. She was tall and slender — thus much the dress exposed — and she moved with grace ; and while I watched her swift steps, she was gone in the crowd, and I was alone.

" I hastened out into the open space before the church, but in such a mass of men and women, each woman al- most a fac-simile of all the others, how could I hope to find her. Withal there was one of the daily battles be- tween a Greek and a Latin priest going on in the court, and victory long hesitated which of the two to crown, so that, by the time I made my way to the little arch that leads out by the ruins of the Church of St. John and the Hospital of the Knights, all possibility of tracing the un- known was lost, and I was left to my imaginations.

" I sat in the afternoon on the front of my shop in the bazaar, smoking and thinking — thinking, doubtless, of the face I had seen in the morning and the voice I had heard, for why should I not ? I was alone in the world — alone in Jerusalem — nor living man or woman could claim right to challenge my thinking of any beautiful woman I chose to occupy myself about.

44 I GO A -FISHING.

"The next shop to my own was that of a money- changer. You know that the shops of Jerusalem are not like our English and American shops. The bazaar is one long, narrow street, roofed over and glazed, so that the rain never falls on a shop front. The shops are each about as large as an ordinary show-window in a Broad- way store — say six or seven feet wide and as many deep — and the door is but a shutter, hinged at the bottom, which falls down, and, standing out in the street, makes a litthe platform in front of the shop on which the mer- chant sits ; so that the bazaar is lined with a row of mer- chants on each side, sitting only a few feet apart, and each one can reach all the contents of his shelves almost without rising from his seat, and can light the pipe of his opposite neighbor without moving.

" A camel heavily laden was coming down the bazaar, and had reached the point nearly in front of me, when a horseman, followed by ten or a dozen others, came up from the street of David. It was manifest that one or the other must turn back, for there was not room for the horse- men to pass. The leader of the party was a young man, dressed in the gorgeous style of the Lebanon Druses. No one could doubt that he was a prince of that proud and strange race, and the haughty style in which he shouted to the Arab camel driver only made the surmise more sure.

" But the Arab was from the Jordan Ghor, and Arabs of that neighborhood seldom give way to mortal man. It therefore seemed that the horseman would be ignomini- ously overturned, to his own confusion and the imminent danger of my shop and wares, for the Ishmaelite came on without a pause, his huge camel swinging now to the right and now to the left, his heavy load of the drift-wood of

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 45

the Dead Sea threatening to carry away the very sides of the bazaar.

" The horseman reined up, or rather spoke to his horse, who, Hke a true desert mare, stopped as if she were sud- denly turned to a statue. Again he shouted to the Arab, who hung lounging over the neck of his camel with an appearance of nonchalance or stupidity that might well have imposed on a stranger to Arab customs, but with his keen black eye flashing from under the shawl that hung over his head. The horseman was no stranger. The next instant he uttered the sharp hiss that camels under- stand, and with the utterance mingled the report of his pistol. The camel paused with uplifted foot. The Arab fell under the foot as it came down, the huge, spongy mass rolling him over, but not crushing him.

" ' He is dead,' I exclaimed involuntarily in English.

" ' Only frightened,' said the Druse, in as good English as mine : and, turning to his attendants, he uttered some words of command which sufficed to clear the way before him in a few seconds, and they were gone, leaving the Arab lying in the gutter which runs along the middle of the streets in Jerusalem, instead of at the sides as in other cities.

" English again ! and this time from a Druse; and good sounding English, with a hearty smack of familiarity about it which left no doubt that the speaker had used that tongue from his childhood. Only two words, but enough for my brain to work upon, and so I pondered till the sun went down, and then I walked on the wall above the Zion Gate, and thought on the matter. For all this made up a startling subject of thought for a Jew in Jerusalem.

" Meantime the Arab had picked himself out of the gut- ter. For Mohammedan or Jew durst not touch a man

46 I GO A -FISHING.

supposed to be shot by a Druse, and he might have lahi there and bled to death, for aught they dared do till some Turkish officer had passed an opinion on him. I was just getting off my shop front to go to his assistance, but he had found leisure to recover his scattered brains, and rose to his feet. Finding no bullet-hole in his body, to his evident astonishment, he went to seek his wandering cam- el down the nearest cross street, and then came back by our way.

" Achmed Haraga, the money-changer next me, ex- changed a word with him as he came along, and a sign that spoke more than words. I had learned that sign in Bagdad, and I knew what it meant. If I had time I would tell you how I learned it.

" I walked on the wall over Mount Zion, and thought of the woman I had seen by the Sepulchre. There was something very home-like about that English voice. It reminded me of my mother. Did I tell you that my mother was a Christian woman ? She was the daughter of — no matter who — but she was a gentle, beautiful girl ; and because she married my father they turned her out of house and home, and cursed her at the fireside where her mother had prayed. Her mother, thank God, was dead. I think that, but for the memory of the Christian treatment her family gave her, I might by her gentle in- fluences have been a Christian. But I never forgot that curse. My mother died when I was young. I remem- bered her face, its exceeding tenderness and beauty, and somehow the voice of the weeping woman brought back to me that beloved countenance. ' To-morrow,' I said. ' Well, I will go to-morrow to the Sepulchre again, and per- haps I shall see her there ;' and, content with that, I went my way homeward by the street of the Armenians.

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 47

"There is a dark archway through which the street passes under the convent. I had no lantern in my hand, and this was a violation of the Turkish rule. It was not surprising, therefore, that as I passed the door of the convent under the arch two of the soldiers of the pasha should seize me, and demand why I was out alone with- out a lantern. I replied that I was an American. They thought my Arabic too good for that, or pretended so to think, and — and — the result was that I had to be rough. I had some skill in that line ; my early education was not neglected. They shouted for help, and several sol- diers were on me in a twinkling. Imagine my surprise, however, when I found myself standing with my back to the convent wall, and not alone in my position of de- fense. Another man, whose features were wholly invisi- ble in the dark, was as hearty as I in the business of our defense ; and, as the melee was altogether too thick for the use of fire-arms, we soon found ourselves fully equal to the task of keeping at bay the entire lot of Mos- lem soldiers.

" ' How long is this to last, however ?' I asked in Ara- bic, after we had kept them off about five minutes by putting six or eight of them wholly out of the combat.

" ' No longer than we like it,' said my ally, very coolly. ' For my part, I rather enjoy the fun of the thing ; but, if you say so, we'll have help,' and, without waiting my re- ply, he blew a shrill whistle that rang down the street toward the Tower of David, and a troop of horse came up the pavement at a gallop.

" ' Sweep out the archway,' was the ringing order given by my companion, and the next instant the soldiers of the pasha were scattered like chaff, and we were at lib- erty. The good Armenians had long ago bolted and

4$ I GO A- FISHING.

barred their convent doors against Jew, Turk, and infidel, as is their custom when either is likely to demand their services. So we were left to ourselves, and when the troop returned my vahant defender mounted me by his side, and we went at a rattling pace down the hill from the Jaffa gate and up the sharp winding passage that leads south to the gate of the Mograbbins. And here we passed near my own house, and I asked my brave friend to pause, and let me thank him for his aid. But he declined briefly, saying the city would probably be too hot for him to-night.

" ' But shall I not see you again at all, to thank you ?'

" ' Thanks are not needed. I did but my duty. But stay — you live in this quarter ? Then you are a Jew. We are both bound to enmity against this accursed govern- ment. I must hasten now, but I will see you again. Which is your house .^ To-morrow night at this hour I will be there — Sebulkeer ; ' — and he was gone. What nec- romancy was it that a minute later made the gate of the Mograbbins clang heavily as it closed — that gate least often opened in the daytime of any gate of Jeru- salem, and always shut at night as firmly as if sealed with the seal of Solomon ?

"Before noon of the next day I was on watch in the Church of the Sepulchre ; but I watched in vain for the blue gown. There were hundreds of that color ; but the form and step I looked for were absent.

As I stood near the door of the Sepulchre, looking eagerly toward the stone of unction, I became suddenly aware of a conversation carried on in English within the Chapel of the Angel. It was in low tones ; but 1 was standing directly in front of the small hole in the wall through which the Greek priests are accustomed to

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 49

pass out the holy fire on Easter-day, and the persons within doubtless took no note of the existence of such an outlet. They supposed themselves alone, and, having full view of the doorway, imagined that no one was with- in hearing. For you will bear in mind that the Chapel of the Angel is a little chapel in front of the Sepulchre, on the floor of the church, under the great dome.

" ' My daughter,' said in Arabic a voice of singular melody; 'my daughter, your grief seems very heavy — '

"'I do not understand Arabic,' interrupted a female voice in Italian.

" ' I said,' replied the man, in Italian, ' that your grief is very heavy. Can the Church do nothing to console you V

"'I do not speak Italian well enough to converse in it ; my language is English,' was the reply.

"Then followed a few sentences in a low tone which I could not hear — which, indeed, I did not try to hear, for what had I to do with them? and then I heard an exclamation of joy — ' Selim, Selim ! at last, at last !' — and I remembered the voice.

" ' Where, where have you wandered } Every day for a year and more I have been on this spot at noon, and you came not; though when we parted you said we should meet here to-morrow.'

"'I have been a fugitive. Yesterday was the first day I have been able to enter Jerusalem, and last night I was again compelled to assume a disguise. But all is over. We will not part again.'

"'Thank God! thank God !'

" That voice ! that voice ! It had now haunted me four-and-twenty hours. I had made it the business of my life for those hours ; had built up the fabrics of ten^

D

5© I GO A-FISHING.

twenty, a hundred lives on that voice. I had thought, fancied, dreamed about it, until I had some sort of no- tion that I had property in it. And this priest was the robber of what I had, it seemed to me, possessed a life- time. And I was strangely moved when I heard him repeat tenderly, 'Darling, it is all over now; we will not part again.'

" They came out together and passed me, neither one noticing my presence. He wore the dress of a Greek priest. They marry wives ; so there was nothing very strange about this meeting. She was dressed in the or- dinary black-silk bag of a wealthy Oriental lady, and the waddle which her loose shoes made necessary was the remotest possible resemblance to the graceful step of the day previous.

" I followed them to the doorway, the street, down by ihe Mediterranean Hotel, across the street of David, and just there he turned and left her. While I looked at him she was gone, and I lost them both in the crowd. I had no object in following either. My little romance of twenty-four hours was over, and I had seen the begin- ning and end of it.

" I went to my shop and sold silks till the sun set, and then home, to sit by the doorway and dream.

" How much I dreamed in those long years of Eastern life. I dreamed the sunniest dreams — of bright coun- tries, rich with olives and pomegranates, and palms bear- ing dates of Ibreem ! I dreamed that night of my old home in America. I heard the wind in the tree over the gate. I heard the quail whistling in the corn-field down the valley. I heard the dash of the water over the little mill-dam in the ravine. I heard the voice of my father, stern, calm, not affectionate, but always kind. I

ISKANDER EFFENDI.

51

heard most of all the voice of my Christian mother, pray- ing alone, as she was accustomed to pray; for my father forbade her praying with me, and that I believe killed her. Many a time I had wondered whether there was not something in that religion of my gentle mother, and now it came over me with a hitherto unknown force. I knew the Christian story well. Every word of it I had read over and over in former years, for my mother's prayers were not prayers to be overheard and forgotten ; and now, as the sunlight faded above Jerusalem, I re- membered the story of the Passion, and, recalling all its touching mournfulness, I bowed my head.

" ' Iskander the Jew is sorrowful to-night.'

" It was my rescuer of the night previous. He was alone, and would pause now but a moment,

" ' I saw you in the bazaar yesterday,' he said.

"'But I saw you not.'

" ' You do not recognize a Druse without his head- dress.'

" I started to my feet. He smiled, and went on quietly.

" ' You speak English. I heard you when I shot at the scoundrelly Bedouin.'

"'And you replied in English.'

" 'Very true. We will drop the Arabic then, and use the vernacular, especially as we may be overheard. You are an American.'

" ' How know you that ?'

" ' Because no Englishman could do the Oriental as you have, and more especially because of our last night's experience. I am from New York myself, long ago;

you ?'

From the same city.'

52 I GO A- FISHING.

" ' We are fellow-countrymen, as I supposed last night ; and now will you do me a service? One must ask strange things at times. There is a lady in the case, too. Will you give house-room to one in whom I have a deep interest } You have women about yc^ur house, I suppose. Your porter has a wife or two, if he's a Moslem — one, at least, if he's a Jew — I am right? Yes; and will you then let me bring her here for a little while? She will not disturb your quiet. I will say nothing about paying board just now; for I think you understand that I am not of the kind likely to ask a service and leave it unre- warded, nor do I think you are one to ask or receive re- ward for hospitality.'

"It was a very sudden thing; but in ten minutes it was arranged, and in ten more the lady, closely veiled, was in my house. The house was built around a court- yard. The rooms on each side were reached only by steps descending into the court. She had one side of the house, and Hebrew women-servants were engaged for her. When she was at length in possession of her rooms, he came to me and said quietly, ' Will you see her ?'

" I followed him to the harem. Little did I dream of what awaited me. When I reached the room, I found before me, radiant in all her splendid beauty, the lady of the church — such I knew her by the dress and chain of gold — and the lady was Edith !

" I was calm. When was I ever otherwise ? She did not recognize me. Why should she? She thanked me for the hospitality, and I replied briefly, and retired to my seat in the gateway, where, a little later, he left me, pressing my hand and uttering that word which all Orient- als understand as meaning,'! trust you as I trust my God.'

" How faithfully I kept that trust ! At first life seemed

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 53

terrible to me. To have her in my house all day and night, unseen, unapproached, to know that she loved an- other, to half suspect that she was not true even to him, to spend my days in watching the churches and bazaars for the priest, my nights in imagining her story, of which I knew no word — this was very hard. Daily the young man, known to me only as Selim Bey, as I was known to him only as Iskander, came to the house and went in to her apartments. Daily he paused and talked with me a little while, until he said, one day, 'Iskander, I shall be^ absent now some days. Go in and see Edith once in a while ; she will be lonely.'

" I must pass along now rapidly with my story. I did see her. I never saw woman half so lovely. At first I but spoke with her at the doorway of her rooms in the evening and the morning. Then I persuaded her to walk out with me. First we climbed the wall on Mount Zion; then we rambled around the city. Now we walked down the Valley of Jehoshaphat, now ascended the sunny slopes of Olivet. Sometimes we walked as far as Bethany. Once we went on horseback to Bethlehem. . All this time she wound around me the delicious bonds of love.

" I know not that I should say any thing of myself, but I may at least assert that I was not a man to despise either for physical or mental reasons. I was young and strong. I had studied much, read much, traveled much. There were few subjects of ordinary conversation in such a country with which I was not familiar, and she needed no other guide about the Holy City. And while I named all the places, she told me all the thrilling Christian his- tories that cling to them.

" A month glided by. It was the month of May, most delicious of all the year in Jerusalem.

54 I GO A -FISHING.

" One day I was sitting on the front of my shop, in that Hstless way that had now come over me, wrapped in the consciousness of present enjoyment, and dihgently keep- ing out of my brain the bitter truth that I was dreaming of a dehght that was to end suddenly and forever when SeHm should return. I was as happy as man could be. I had thoroughly adapted myself to the Oriental fatalism, content with the present though the next moment should bring destruction.

"Thus indulging my fancy, I sat with my eyes half closed, and Achmed Haraga, the money-changer, might well have thought me sleeping. Nor, indeed, did I my- self see the Bedouin, who, gliding by me, entered into a conversation with the man of gold and silver, until sud- denly my ear caught the name of Selim Bey. Then I listened.

" ' He will come by the well of Birreh. We will not fail. The sons of Ibrahim never forget. But the arms we must have.'

" ' You shall have them to-night at the Damascus gate. But the bracelets must be here to-day.'

" ' They are here.'

" And the Arab produced a small package of heavy gold bracelets, such as the Orientals are accustomed to make rudely out of coin as a convenient means of invest- ment. When they desire money for use, the bracelets pass with the money-changers for their gold value.

" Khalifah, the Bedouin, had been made the messenger of his tribe to negotiate a purchase of arms ; and, from the circumstances, I could not doubt that they were to be used in an attack on Selim, doubtless in revenge for the ignominious overthrow of the Arab in the bazaar; for the man was the same.

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 55

" My resolution was taken at once.

" I closed my shop, and, hastening home, inquired of Edith when she expected Selim. He was to return, the next day. I must be at the well of Birreh, then, in the morning, and watch for him to the northward on the road to Galilee. I had not been living thus long in Jerusalem without providing for myself the means of assistance in just such cases as this. For in the East we were liable at any moment to need the strongest personal defenses; and among my household goods I had a store of arms, while among my acquaintances were men I could depend on for such emergencies. But the time was brief.

" Near Bir Ayoub, on the Jaffa road, I once found an Arab in distress, and succored him. No matter now for the particulars. He was one of the men of Abu Goash, the robber-chief. My man and his family were bound to me by the Eastern laws of gratitude. Seven stout men with horses I could count on from among them, and to them I dispatched a messenger before the gates of Jeru- salem were shut at sunset. They would have no diffi- culty in reaching the appointed place of meeting by day- break in the morning. I myself with one of my servants mounted and left the city in the night, carrying about us enough of the Frankish weapons to arm our expected band. I had a perfect arsenal of revolvers in my belt and shawl, and Mousa, my man, carried as many. We rode northward by the starlight, picking our dangerous way among the rocks; for there are no roads in Syria, and night travel is next to impossible. You know them well, Effendi. The moon rose a little before the dawn, and by its deceptive light we passed the well of Birreh, and the great fields of rocks that lie around the site of Bethel of old. In the olive-groves near Ain Haramieh

56 I GO A- FISHING.

we paused, and as the day was breaking we met my ex- pected allies — ten swarthy sons of Ishmael, mounted on mares of pure blood, ready for any service that I might require of man or beast. I waited here, trusting to inter- cept my friend, who would come from Nablous by this route. How many men he might have with him I could not guess ; but Edith thought it improbable that he would bring more than one attendant.

" As the day came up, and I waited by the side of the way, I confess to you that for the first time a terrible thought came to me. What was this half Druse, half American, to me, that I should risk my life for his ? Were he out of the way, might not Edith the beautiful be mine ? I never heard her name him with the tone that one uses in speaking of an absent lover. Did she love him so much, after all ? Who then was the Greek priest } what was this mystery ? I had scarcely asked myself the ques- tion before. I had been listless, stupid. Oriental in my ways of thinking. Edith was after all as likely to be mine as to be his or the Greek priest's.

" Hours glided along, and we waited under the olive- trees, and I thought thus a hundred wild thoughts. The tempter was with me, and might have triumphed but for a sudden interruption.

" A volley of fire-arms sounded in the valley below. We sprang to the saddle, and dashed down the road at a furious gallop. The scene at the foot of the hill ex- plained itself. The attack that was planned for the well of Birreh had been for some reason changed to the Har- amieh fountain, and, as we reached the foot of the hill, we found Selim standing with his back to the bank at the side of the horse-path, beset by full a score of Arabs, whose volley had killed his two companions.

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 57

" The young American was ready to sell his life dearly. He had fired his revolver twice with fatal precision, but, as the enemy approached him, he had drawn his short yataghan, and, with the strength and skill of an accom- plished swordsman, was keeping off the heads of a dozen lances that were seeking his breast. How easily at that instant I might have been left alone to protect Edith the beautiful ! But I did not pause. We descended on the Arab horde like a thunderbolt. Seven saddles were empty before we closed with them, and then the contest was brief and decisive. Five of the Oulad Ibrahim fled across the hill, and a ball from my revolver lamed for- ever the horse on which the last one rode.

" But the Druse chieftain was not where I had found him. He lay on the ground, bleeding from a ghastly wound. As I sprang to his side he murmured, the words gurgling in blood, 'Lift me, Iskander — gently. It's all up with me.'

" I lifted him with one arm around his shoulders. His head fell on my breast, but he revived a little at the change in his position. We made a litter of branches, and carried him gently to Birreh. I had sent a messen- ger for Edith, and she arrived at the huts by the well just as we brought him there. We carried him into the cov- ered house, the pilgrim's resting-place by the well, and made him as comfortable as we could; but life was fast ebbing away, and when the evening approached he was dying.

" Edith sat by him, Edith the beautiful — how beauti- ful ! There was no wild emotion of grief in the dear girl. She sat down by his side as the wife of a chieftain of Mount Lebanon should, and tenderly cared for him with tearless eyes.

58 , I GO A -FISHING. /

" At length, as I sat holding his head on my breast, he turned his face so as to look up into my eyes. His gaze was long and steadfast, as if his soul would pierce my own. Then he spoke slowly, painfully, in Arabic.

'"Thy face has all the tenderness of the face that comes to me in dreams. Her face — so heavenly !'

Ali Benhammed, my Arab friend, stood looking at us, and, as the features of the dying chief lay close to mine, uttered an exclamation of astonishment. The other Arabs crowding around said aloud, ' They are brothers !'

" ' Iskander Effendi,' said Ali to me, ' is the Druse your brother ?'

"There was something in the question that startled me.

" ' Selim, who was your father,' I said.

"'Why seek to know, Iskander? Even Edith never knew.'

"'Because my father was a Hebrew^, and my mother a Christian, and they have told me that my younger brother died.'

"'Allah! can this be!' he exclaimed, trembling so that Edith, who did not understand us, for we talked in Arabic, sprang to his side, fearing that this was the death- struggle. But it was not yet the hour of parting. I had found my kindred ; for Selim the Druse was verily my brother ! Found him for one hour — one hour — and after that, where should we meet again ? In the Jerusalem of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, or never again ?

"The story was told slowly in broken accents, and Edith and I listened all the night, wiping his lips and begging him to rest. But he would tell it, and we heard it all. Briefly, all that concerns you to know was this :

" Between our father and mother was made an agree-

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 59

ment, of which I never heard until I now learned it from my brother. It was that their children should be edu- cated alternately in the faith of the father and the moth- er. The first child was to be educated by the father, and this was duly carried out with me. But when the second child was born, the father caused the mother to believe that it survived only a few hours, while he, in fact, conveyed the babe to his friends in a distant city, where he was brought up in ignorance of his parentage, and in the Hebrew faith.

"The guardian of the boy was abundantly supplied with money, and was instructed to spare no expense in his education. He finally brought him to Jerusalem, where, in the midst of the impressive scenes that sur- rounded him, and in the presence of his father, the story of his birth was revealed. He was a boy of spirit, and the history had not the effect that was anticipated. His soul revolted at it. He disowned his father, ran away from his guardian, and sought to escape the bitterness of his own anger by leading the life of an adventurer in the East. Chance threw him among the Druses, and he became one of them. His education and skill soon en- abled him to control the fiery race of the followers of El-Hakim, and he became an Emir. Several years had passed, and he was engaged in plots for the overthrow of the Turkish power in the entire pashalic of Damas- cus. He was the head of the conspiracy. Its branches extended from Alexandria to Aleppo. Three years pre- viously he had rescued from the hands of an attacking party of Bedouins a little group of travelers. An old man and his daughter were among them — Americans — who were traveling, with two Englishmen in the party. The fright rendered the old man helpless, and the Druse

6o I GO A- FISHING.

chief took him on a litter to his own house in the Leb- anon hills. I might have said his palace, for such it was. For six months the father lingered in the Druse fastness, and during that time his daughter won the heart of the Druse chieftain ; then the father died, and the daughter was left in his home. They were married after the Druse fashion; but she was of American faith, and the cere- mony, though she yielded to it at the time, never seemed to her a valid marriage, and she pined at the thought of her dishonor. Then he carried her to Jerusalem, that they might be married there by the English bishop; but when he was arranging it, sudden flight became neces- sary. He promised to meet her at the Sepulchre the next day at noon in disguise, and with this hasty prom- ise he left her alone in the Holy City. For a year he dared not approach her, remaining among his mountain warriors, while she was shut up in the house of an Arab woman, visiting only the Church of the Sepulchre daily, to watch and weep and pray. He met her there at last, disguised as a priest, in the Chapel of the Angel, and that night they were married by the English prelate. Then he placed her in my charge, and then followed the events already known.

"And so I had found my kindred. I was not alone now.

" ' I thank God for this, Iskander. I have not thanked God before since — since — Iskander, thou art of the faith of our father ?'

" ' Nay, Selim ; I think I could be a Christian since I have known thy wife Edith. The curse of my mother's father made me hate the Christian faith. So the sin of my father has well nigh won me to it by sending her to me. Our mother was an angel of God, Selim.'

ISKANDER EFFENDI. 6l

" Edith knelt by his side and whispered —

" ' And thou, SeHm ?'

" ' I ahnost believe in thy words, dear one. I have wandered far from the dear old land. I have long for- gotten all faith. But thou hast almost won me. Speak to me of the Son of Mary.'

" So she spoke gently in low accents of singular melody — telling us all the story of the Passion and the Exaltation. And Selim, lying on the ground at Beitin — even where his father Jacob lay of old — by the same spring that soothed the sleep of Israel, saw, as his father saw, the heavens opened, and angels ascending and descending. And the face of Edith was the holiest of all, as she knelt by his side and prayed.

" Effendi, I believe that the prayers were heard. Doubt- less the smile of joy that stole over his face as the dawn came into the east was the answer of our God, the God of Jacob. When the sun was rising over the hills of Moab, he stretched his right hand out, and threw it over Edith's neck, and drew her down to him, and pressed his lips to hers in a long kiss, and then I received her in my arms as she fell back from his dead embrace.

" We buried him under the wall of Jerusalem, outside the Zion gate, where the Christian dead are congregated. Edith and I prayed at the Sepulchre together that after- noon.

" I closed my shop in the bazaar, sold my silks to the merchants, and with Edith came to America. I am grow- ing old. Edith is dead. Her child, whom you remember, is lying yonder under the pine-tree. All that I have loved best is gone out of this world. But you know me well enough to know that I am not a gloomy man, though very lonesome and surrounded by many sad recollections.

62 I GO A -FISHING.

Sometimes I am heavily oppressed with the weight of all that I have seen and suffered, and when the load grows too heavy, I leave my city home and come here to go a-fishing. So I grow calm, patient, and content. So, Effendi, it grows to be well with me — it is peace.

" ' Salaam aleikoum Ya Effendi !'

"' Es salamak Ya Braheem.' "

And peace was with us all that night.

IV.

MORNING TROUT; EVENING TALK.

Early next morning I was out to breathe the air. There had been a shower in the night, but the sun rose clear, and I saw the first rays that found their way down into the valley. The drops of last night's moisture yet remaining on the leaves sparkled and shone like dia- monds. There was a flock of young goslings in the pond when I approached it, and they seemed to enjoy the sun- shine keenly. I fancy they had never seen it but two or three mornings before, and it might well astonish them.

Think of it ! Suppose, my friend, that you had never seen the sunshine but twice or three times in your life, with what splendor would the great day king roll up the eastern sky for you; with what glory would the heavens be filled ; with what unutterable magnificence would he go down the west; and in what wondering awe, and si- lent, voiceless astonishment would he leave you in the still and solemn twilight ! Is the sunshine any less grand, or the sun's pathway any less glorious, or the day's de- cline any less stately, in fact, than it would be if you had been born in a cavern, and had never seen the daylight till to-day ?

Why, then, is it so commonplace ?

" Because you are used to it, and have seen enough of it." Is that your answer?

64 I GO A- FISHING.

Man, there will come an hour when, as a just punish- ment for that hackneyism of soul that you permit and are proud of, God will shut out the glories of his world from your vision, and, in the gathering gloom that shall then thicken around you, you will cry out for light ; but the broad glare of the noonday sun shall not then prevail to pierce the shadows.

I was speaking of the goslings. They shook their tiny wings in the first sunlight, and poked their bills less fre- quently under them, and moved about with more freedom as I was approaching the pond, when suddenly I saw them rush in confusion hither and thither, and so great was their consternation that I did not miss one of them that had disappeared under the water. But a moment later, a mink stole out of the water at the upper end of the pond, and before I could throw a stone at him, almost before I could shout, he disappeared in the wood with a youngster in his felonious jaws.

" Never mind," said Philip, approaching while I was staring after the wretch — " never mind ; the gosling would only have lived to be a goose."

" It isn't the loss of a gosling, but the audacity of the thief. I can't bear such impertinence."

" What are you going to do about it ?"

"Take a ride and think of it."

" Agreed. But not till we have had breakfast."

The black ponies were before the light spring wagon, and Philip, with Dr. Johnston, drove, while John and my- self went in the saddle. Under the seat of the wagon were carefully stowed the rods and a fowling-piece ; for it is a safe rule that a sportsman pursues — never to be without his tools when there is even a bare possibility that he may want them.

SQUIRREL SHOOTING. 65

Down the glen-shaded lane the wagon rattled, and we brought up the rear at a gallop, which soon exhilarated us, and as we turned into the road we flew by the wagon, and led up the long hill through the forest. The road was in a capital condition. The shower had not left a drop of standing water. Even the horses seemed to ap- preciate the freshness of the air and the purity of the morning. As we crossed the hill-top, John caught sight of a gray squirrel in the road, and with a shout dashed off after him. The quick fellow was as fast as six horses, and was up an oak-tree before the gray had made his third leap. The wagon was close behind, and John sprang to the ground, and, throwing his rein to Philip, seized the gun, and called me to help him "surround the squirrel."

There is no "season" for squirrel shooting. Enemies to the farmer, they are to be regarded as fair game in spring, summer, or autumn. " Surrounding " a gray squir- rel is one of the most exciting of forest sports. The game is small, but the fun is always large. I have had as much exhilaration, excitement, and fatigue in a gray -squirrel hunt as in any bear or wolf hunt it was ever my fortune to join. I rode around the tree half a dozen times, while John stood watching to catch a whisk of the squirrel's tail or the slightest motion of his body. But he was en- sconced in some crotch or cavity of the limbs, and would not stir. At length I dismounted, and, taking a large stone, commenced hammering on the trunk. It would seem as if these fellows were used to having their trees cut down, and themselves caught in that way, for gener- ally, when they hear a sound and feel a trembling that re- sembles the blows of an axe, they hasten to evacuate; and so this one, when I began to pound, started for the next tree, and was stopped in the air by the load of shot

E

66 I GO A- FISHING.

which John sent after him. He fell fifty feet in a sheer fall, and struck the ground with a sound like a falling stone. Used to their proceedings, John sprang for him, but he was not there. Quick as a flash, he was up the next tree, and the second load of shot rattled into the trunk as his gray tail whisked around the other side of it, and he went up into leafy obscurity.

While John loaded, I laughed ; and now mounting again, I rode around among the trees, and at length caught sight of the squirrel, apparently sky-gazing, among the leaves on the extreme topmost branch of the tree, quite out of reach of shot. How to dislodge him was the ques- tion, for, as to mounting the tree, neither of us would think of it ; and while we took breath and cogitated, Simmons, shoe-maker at the cross-roads, came trudging up the road, with his rifle on his shoulder, bound on a hunt. Of him John borrowed the weapon that had been for so many years familiar to his hands, and with a light toss and a quick sight he shot. The squirrel came down, plunging through the leaves of the tree, and by limbs where, had he been living, he would have caught and held on, and struck the ground close by my horse, who sprang into the air and kept me occupied in quieting him till John had placed his gun and game in the wagon, and was mounted by my side.

Then we dashed off" and down the hill-side, still through forest, pausing now and then to gather flowers or to rest in cool, deep shades, and once to drink of a spring that trickled from the bank, clear and cold.

Passing across the plain, we paused at the gate of a house which stood under a large oak-tree, to inquire after the health of an old man, the oldest man in the neighbor- hood, whose years were well-nigh exhausted. They told

COUNTRY SADNESS. 67

US sadly that he was no better. They need not have told us. There was a look about the place which said the same before we saw them. There is always a something about the country that indicates the sadness or happiness of the country folk. The first sound that we heard on approaching was the creak of the well-pole, and it was a mournful sound, different from its usual tone of cheer ; for there is music in that creaking pole when swiftly han- dled. Then we heard a gate swinging, and the rattle of the chain, and there was something unusually sad about that. There was a flock of geese on the road near the house, and they were all silent as we passed; and the old turkey on the wall looked and stretched his head out, and his long, red neck was glistening in the sun, but he uttered none of his accustomed exclamations of pride. The shut- ters of the old windows were closed. There was not one open on all the end of the house toward the road. In short, there was an indescribable something about the place which you who have lived in the country will un- derstand, and which you who have never lived there can not be made to understand, which indicated that those in the house were in deep affliction of some sort, either bid- ding adieu to one who was going, or looking at the vacant place of one who had gone.

We did not go in, but remained at the gate while the Doctor entered, bearing the kind wishes of all our party; and as we drove on afterward we were somewhat sad- dened by his description of the wan features and long white hair of the good old man, who was so soon to depart from the scenes that he had loved for eighty years.

And now with a short turn we left the road, and entered a forest that is almost like an oak opening of prairie land. Here we rested, and, leaving the horses, strolled down the

68 I GO A- FISHING.

hill in the deep shade to a spot of more sylvan beauty than I can describe.

Here the trees are very lofty, growing from rich, deep soil. There are no branches on them for fifty feet, and at that height or a greater they interlace their branches, and what sunshine comes through comes feloniously, and steals down as if half fearful of being driven out. A trav- eling stream, a cool, merry child of the hills and woods, comes dashing down the side of the hill over a rocky bed, and, leaping at last with a bound of delight into a moss- edged basin where the small trout congregate, and where sometimes a larger one is found, escapes over a bed of clean gravel into the waters of a lake lying among the hills, and abounding in trout of two varieties. The largest variety is the lake trout, so called by most sportsmen; and in this lake one has been taken weighing a trifle over thirty pounds. The ordinary brook trout is also found there in plenty ; but I had never seen one taken from the lake which weighed over a pound and three quarters.

Before we descended the slope to the basin of the brook Dr. Johnston put his rod together, and adjusted a cast of flies. The water in the basin was as clear as crystal, not more than six feet deep, and there was no bush to cover the approach. Neither was a long cast practicable among the trees. It was therefore a scene to laugh at as the learned Doctor descended the slope, with his head bowed down as low as his rotundity of body would permit, and at length progressed on hands and knees until within a rod of the edge of the basin. Here he raised his head cautiously till he could see the surface of the shining water, and, holding his rod in the right hand and his line in the left, bent the spring back, and let it fly off" with the line and leader and flies in the

he's a whale. 69

air, then, with just the most delicate twist of his wrist, laid the flies on the farther side of the basin, and drew them over the glassy water. A rise, a sharp strike, and — it will happen to the best of anglers, sometimes — a small chub had risen to the fly, and the short sharp stroke lifted him like a shot into the air. He went over the Doctor's head, and twenty feet behind him into a low pine-bush, where the leader was effectually entan- gled. So the Doctor crawled up the slope, disengaged his leader, returned to the old spot, and three times sent his flies by that graceful cast over the basin. Then, in- stead of lifting the line, he threw a wave into it from the end of the slender rod, and as the wave ran along it lift- ed the flies and laid them down again out of his sight, but under the very edge of the bank at the side of the brook-fall. He did not, but we from the top of the slop- ing ground did, see the magnificent rise with which the tail fly was seized; but he felt it, and was on his feet in an instant. Once around the basin went the sharp cut of the line through the water, and then like lightning the fish rushed out over the gravel into the lake. There the Doctor saw him, as we did not. " He's a whale," I heard him mutter, as he pressed his finger on the line that was paying out with the reel music, and all the time he was advancing step by step toward the lake-shore, but never losing the bend of his rod.

The length of time required to kill a trout on a fly-rod depends on the size and strength of the fish, and on the weight of the rod. The Doctor was handling a seven-ounce rod, and the fish was strong. He accepted a cigar which I offered him, lit it, and was patient. He had checked the fish with a hundred feet of line out; and now the plucky animal was swaying back and forth in arcs of a

70 I GO A-FISHING.

circle, refusing utterly every invitation to make the ra- dius shorter.

" How much does he weigh, Doctor ?"

" Five pounds, if an ounce, and something more ; he's by far the biggest and the strongest fish I ever struck in these waters."

" Be patient, Doctor."

" Hum."

" Take it easy, old friend. Don't get excited. Keep your nerves steady, and your brain — "

" Shut up, will you, John ?"

" Can't you take advice ? You're fond of giving it. Look out there ! Jove, what a rush that was !"

And so it was. The trout had made a sudden dash for deeper water. The Doctor could not spare twelve yards more of line, and, as he saw it going out, he fol- lowed his fish into the lake. Fortunately it shoaled off gradually, but he did not turn the obstinate trout till he stood in three feet of water ; and there he stood for near- ly ten minutes while the contest went on. Nearer and nearer to him came the trout, then he was off again ; then nearer by a slow reeling-in, then away with a mad rush. But at last he gave up suddenly, as fat fish are apt to do ; and the fisherman, bringing him up to his side, having no landing-net, dexterously passed his hand under his throat, and, burying thumb and finger in his gills, walked ashore with a trout that weighed five pounds and seven ounces on the scales at the Rookery when we reached home.

This was the largest trout that had been killed in that neighborhood within the memory of man. And the brook trout is not found in many localities as large. In Maine I have seen many brook trout weighing over eight

HOBBIES. 71

pounds each, and have evidence, satisfactory to me, that at least two trout, the veritable Sahno fofitifialis, our speckled brook trout, were killed in Rangely Lake weigh- ing a trifle over eleven pounds each. This was years ago, when I first knew those waters, before these times in which they are more thoroughly fished; but at the present day it is not uncommon to take them in Moose- tockmaguntic and Rangely lakes running over seven pounds.

Always when the Doctor has killed a large fish he be- comes talkative, but not as in town, where he is apt, if excited, to be intolerant and abusive. One may as well use plain words and speak truth, and I do it though he be in a rage when he reads what I have written. It would seem as if piscatorial success mollified the inner man and toned down the more objectionable characteristics. We all know that anglers love to talk, and to talk of their several special hobbies, whatever they may be. Hence it occurs that parties going a-fishing together find no lack of subjects of conversation, and there is no subject in the world which does not properly and naturally belong to trout - fishing as one of its accompaniments. I have a friend who is given to paleontological studies when in his own library, and who, when we are fishing together, talks steadfastly from morning till night, and oftener from night till morning, about fossils and formations that are utterly unintelligible to me. But do I stop him ? Not at all. An angler would no more think of stopping his friend's trotting on a hobby than he would of stopping the noise of a brook that he was fishing. For what one of us may not find the time when he wants a passive, con- tented listener? It's a luxury to have a human ear to talk into, even if all you say goes out at the ear opposite.

72 I GO A-FISHING.

An angler talks sometimes as he casts ; right along, steadily, perseveringly ; without a rise, without, after a little, even expecting a rise. That being a custom of the guild, it would be out of place and character to stop the talking of a fellow-angler.

As we rode home the Doctor talked with great satis- faction, and, as anglers are apt to do, rode his favor- ite hobby, which had nothing to do with trout-fishing. Philip had received a package of old books from Leipsic a few days before, and among them were some of the Basle editions of the works of Erasmus — those beautiful editions which Froben ornamented with borders by Urse Graff, and initial letters which are attributed by some to Holbein. The Doctor is not a collector of books him- self, but is something of a Dibdin, enjoying the libraries of his friends, and it is not saying much to affirm that he knows more about old books and old editions than Mr. Dibdin ever knew. So he began to discuss with Philip a question in which he is interested, and no one else in America can possibly be interested, as to what was the first book which Erasmus ever published. Now this hap- pened, without being directly in my line, to be a point on which I fancied I could throw a little light, and as they dismounted at the door, and I heard the Doctor affirm, " I tell you, the edition of his friend Hermann's poems is the first thing he ever put to press," I put in a word —

" That's Mercator's edition of 1497, isn't it. Doctor?"

" Yes, it is" (very gruffly).

"Well, Erasmus published poems of his own before that."

" What do you know about it ? Stick to your old wood- cuts, and don't bother about editions."

" But I've got the book."

ERASMUS. 73

" With wood-cuts ?"

"With only one, the large printer's mark of Denidel."

" What's the date ?"

" No date."

" What's the poetry ?"

By this time we were in the library, and before I an- swered I hunted up a memorandum I had given Philip when I first noticed the book in my own library, and read it to the Doctor : " De casa Natalitia Jesu et paupere puerperio sive virginis Marie Carmen noviter emendatum. Title-page has Denidel's book-mark ; follow two pages of a letter of Erasmus to Boethius, dated at end, Scriptum ruri tumultuarie sexto Idus novembres; nineteen pages of seven different short poems by Erasmus ; and at the end a statement that this is a corrected edition, the former hav- ing contained errors. This occurs in the colophon: 'Au- tor et impressor presentis codicis almi sistantur rutilo post sua fata polo.' " " Now, Doctor, if you can find any account of that book in any bibliography, or any life of Erasmus, let me know about it, won't you V

" Of course I will. Does Ehrard mention it .?"

" No. But the whole science of bibliography is in its infancy. Men copy one another instead of making per- sonal examinations. It's astonishing how much history is a repetition of old stories that never had any authority."

" What do you know about bibliography ? You talk as if you were a dealer in old books. You have a few lots of old wood-cut illustrations, well enough in their way, but you are lamentably ignorant of old books. The science of bibliography is more nearly a complete science than any I know of. It is true there is no one work that will answer all your purposes, but — "

" No, nor any ten works. But let that pass. John has

74 I GO A- FISHING.

here a good copy of the Frankfort edition of your friend Pirkheimer. What a wretch the old fellow was !"

"There you are again. Now, what have you read of his works. What reason have you for abusing a learned man like that, the friend of the great Reformers, the patron of art ? You know no more about Pirkheimer than you know of trout-fishing."

"I'm ashamed of you, Doctor. I didn't think you would be guilty of defending a notorious libertine, an in- flated egotist, one who sought notoriety by attaching him- self to great men, and patronized art not for the art's sake, but for the sake of being a patron."

" Why, Effendi," said Philip, " what's the matter ? Did Bilibald ever insult you? Where did you meet him to get in such a rage with him ?"

" I meet him in my own librar}^ every day, for whenever I look at one of Diirer's Madonnas or pictures of the Virgin in any scene of her life, I wonder if the face of his wife Agnes is there, and, while looking for it, I am always sure to see the brutal physiognomy of Bilibald Pirkheimer, who has outraged Diirer and vilified poor Agnes by mak- ing her famous for all time as a vixen, when I have no manner of doubt she was a pure, gentle, and lovely woman."

" I thought every one had agreed about Agnes Diirer. I'm sure one meets only one story about her in all the books."

"Yes; and, as I said just now, history is a repetition of old stories, and in this case it is a repetition of one old falsehood told by the lying pen of Pirkheimer.

" No woman has been more vilified in history than Ag- nes Diirer, and none more wrongfully. She may have been worse than she is represented ; but until we have a

AGNES DURER. 75

better witness against her than Bilibald Pirkheimer, she should be regarded as a loved and lovely woman. It is strange that so many admirers of the great master who have written concerning his life should have been content to follow this old story, told by a man notoriously unfit to express an opinion about a virtuous woman, and do not seem ever to have entertained a notion that his accusa- tions were unworthy credit. If he were otherwise cred- ible, it would tell much against him that he should volun- teer to a stranger a sharp tirade against the character of a woman with whom he confesses his relations have been always unfriendly. What business had this fat egotist to write such a letter about a woman at all ? If he would be guilty of such a letter about the wife of his friend, I can well believe that he would not stop at falsehood.

"Let us gather all the testimony which exists on the subject of Agnes Diirer's character, and we shall find that Bilibald Pirkheimer is the solitary witness against her. Upon analyzing his evidence, we find this to be the state of facts. After Diirer was dead, Pirkheimer had occa- sion to write a long letter to one Tcherte, in Vienna, and, alluding to Diirer's death and his own relations to him, he breaks out into a tirade against Diirer's widow. He says, in substance, that she had always regarded him as her enemy, and that since Diirer's death she would not see him nor have any thing to do with him ; he ascribes Diirer's death to her, says that she worried him always, and the specific effect which he charges her with produ- cing was that Durer was dried up, and did not dare to go into society or indulge in gayety ; he had often expost- ulated with her, and told her that she would kill her hus- band by keeping him so closely at work; but he only met with her ingratitude ; for whoever was a friend of her

76 I GO A- FISHING.

husband's she regarded as her enemy. In this same let- ter he complains that Agnes had disposed of a pair of stag's antlers, and many other fine things of Diirer's, which he had wanted, but she sold them for a mere trifle, and did not let him know.

" Here comes in a suspicion. If Agnes loved money so much, why throw away these fine things ? And, again, what is Pirkheimer's motive in writing all this tirade about his friend's wife and himself to a stranger ? for Tcherte appears by this very letter to be a new correspondent, not an old friend. Above all, who was this Piikheimer, and what his character, that we may weigh his testimony against a woman, a widow, and the widow of his friend ? In this same letter he tells Tcherte that she and her sis- ter are pious and honorable women, but that he would prefer to have business with a loose woman rather than with such a scolding, fault-finding, pious woman. Now Pirkheimer, as we know from abundant evidence, had much familiarity with loose women. Beyond dispute, he was a fat, sensual man, given to free life, denying himself nothing on the score of morality, and both in his corres- pondence and his intercourse with Diirer seeking to make him the confidant of his adventures, and receiving always admonitions in return, given sometimes sharply and some- times in ridicule. His character was such that we are fully justified in regarding him as unfit to express an opinion in regard to a pure woman. We will take his tes- timony, therefore, only for what it is worth, and out of his own story of his relations to Agnes Diirer construct a his- tory which seems far more likely to be the true one than this which has generally been accepted from his tirade.

" Diirer and Pirkheimer were friends in boyhood. The latter was rich, and of high rank in the old city ; the for-

AGNES DURER. 77

mer was poor, the son of an honest goldsmith, who had counted no less than eighteen children in his family, most of whom, indeed, had died in very early life. As they grew up, the friendship continued ; but while the artist was driven to hard work for his bread, the rich man de- voted his life to luxury. Diirer married a young girl of good family and of great beauty. He needed just such a wife as she proved. Her influence on his life was all for good. Pirkheimer grew to be a dissolute man, and Diirer had hard work to resist his constant desire to carry him off from his wife and his studio to join in ' gayety.' Then commenced the differences between the artist's wife and his friend. We can plainly see what he means when he writes Tcherte that she prevented Albert from going into society or indulging in gayety. The sort of society and gayety which Pirkheimer desired him to enjoy is abun- dantly evident from his correspondence when the artist was in Venice. The young wife had a more powerful in- fluence on the artist than his old friend and all his allur- ing temptations. The result which came about is just what we often see in modern life. The friend of the man takes a strong dislike to the woman who wins the greater influence, and the woman can never forgive the man who wishes to draw her husband from her to low and vile asso- ciations."

The Doctor. "There is a story that Agnes used to sit above her husband's working-room, and keep him at his work by speaking through a hole in the ceiling."

" Yes ; and it has no other foundation than this, that some one who had taken Pirkheimer's evidence against Agnes imagined this absurd story. If such a hole there was, I have little doubt that sometimes, when Albert was bored to the last extreme by such lazy loungers as Pirk-

78 I GO A-FISHING.

heimer, stupid from last night's excesses, and not able to see that his friend wanted to be at work, Agnes would come to his help by calling out, ' Albrecht, are you alone? I am coming down to see you.' I would take my affida- vit that through that hole in the ceiling a thousand kind words went up and down, and never one either way that was not loving.

"Dismiss Pirkheimer and his libels from our minds, and we may construct for Diirer a home full of all that was beautiful and lovely. He had his mother, and it was the delight of his life to care for her in the lonesome years of coming age ; his young brother, whom he watched and guided with tender anxiety; above all, his gentle, beautiful, and faithful wife, whose face is the Madonna that he best liked of all his works, always with him, al- ways enjoying with him those wonderful conceptions of the beauty and grandeur of the unseen world, those ex- quisite home ideas of the life of the Virgin mother of the Lord, sharing constantly his every thought of earth and heaven.

"But I am not disposed to deal with imaginations now. I prefer a plain discussion of known facts. There is a great error, and succession of errors, in which writers have followed one another like a flock of sheep, concern- ing Diirer's letters to Pirkheimer written from Venice in 1506. The first mistake is made in regarding it as strange that he so seldom mentions his wife, and that his few mes- sages to her are so cold. Enough, in reply to this, that he knew his wife's opinion of Pirkheimer, and their estab- lished dislike, and he therefore exercised discretion and judgment in his correspondence. Still more, he knew Pirkheimer, and had no desire to talk to him about one so pure as Agnes.

AGNES DiJRER. 79

" In substance, he is to be understood as saying, ' You and I are friends, but let my wife alone.' Curious blun- ders are made by all translators of the queer old Bavarian dialect in which he writes. One serious blunder occurs in the latest English book — a very good book, too — Mrs. Heaton's — where the meaning of a sentence is wholly changed. Pirkheimer had spoken in his coarse way of many persons and things, and, among others, had for once ventured to speak of the artist's wife. His remark was, in effect, that if Diirer did not hasten home, ' I will make love to your wife.' The word which I translate ' make love' is capable of several translations, conveying a coarse idea, or a more common signification — tease, annoy, tor- ment. Diirer's reply is short, sharp, and distinct, but strangely mistranslated by Mrs. Heaton, by Scott, and by others. He does not say, ' You may keep her till death.' He never wrote such a brutal sentence. But he replies, simply, 'This is wrong; you will bring her to her death.' The only meaning properly to be extracted from this is a reproof as sharp as he could use to his creditor, to whom he was then under heavy obligations, and unable to pay. Neither is Agnes the ' reckon-mistress ' named in these letters. On the contrary, coupled as this 'reckon-mis- tress' is with women of loose character of Pirkheimer's acquaintance, she is clearly one of them, and no one should have dreamed that Diirer joined his wife and such persons in one sentence.

" Her reputation as a saving person is to her credit, since we have abundant evidence that she was not nig- gardly, Pirkheimer to the contrary notwithstanding; for she never seems to have restrained Diirer in his free pur- chases of curiosities and objects of taste in art, and the furniture of their home was luxurious and elesrant for the

8o I GO A-FISHING.

period. Many a money-lender has found an artist's wife much more careful to compel exact and honest dealing than the free and careless artist, and has thence taken deep offense.

" We know so little of Diirer's private life, have such very brief extracts from his journals and correspondence, and possess so litde on which to construct his home life, that every one seems to have seized on Pirkheimer's let- ter to Tcherte, and thereon founded the current theory about Agnes, interpreting every possible suggestion by this false light.

"We know absolutely nothing about the family life in the old Nuremberg house, save only that Diirer lived at home and found his pleasures there. And from that old home at length Diirer "emigravit," as saith the record on his tomb — went away to another and fairer country, where many of his dreams became realities of glory. No record is left us of the later hours of his life, in the gloom that was settling in the artist's chamber. We may be- lieve, if this miserable libeler, Pirkheimer, can be kept si- lent while we imagine the scene, that those last hours were full of tender and holy conversation, not unmingled with lookings forward to a reunion. It was doubtless agreed that they two would rest together until the resur- rection, for he was laid in her father's tomb.

" Then she was left to the world and her memories of the man who, more than all other men, had taught Ger- many to love the beautiful, and filled it with that exceed- ing splendor of light which to this day characterizes Ger- man art.

" As soon as they had laid the artist in the grave, Pirk- heimer sought to possess himself of the treasures of art with which he had been surrounded. They were many

AGNES DURER. 8 1

and valuable. The incident of the stag's horns is but one. There were other beautiful things, as we know, and as Pirkheimer says to Tcherte, and Agnes did not let him have them. Why should she ? He had always been her traducer, had long sought in vain to sow dis- cord between her and her husband, and she had good right to have done with him thenceforth forever. Doubt- less she very plainly gave him so to understand, and dis- tributed the memorials of the artist among those who could share with her the memories of an affection that had always been offensive to the man who had so much and so long vilified her. Then the ire of the fat patri- cian arose, and he went storming around Nuremberg, telling all men that if Diirer had only drank more wine, and eaten more suppers, and lived a gayer life with him, he would have lived longer. And this being his promi- nent sensation at the time, he can not resist the tempta- tion to put it in a letter to Tcherte, a stranger to whom he had occasion to write ; and the letter survives to dark- en the memory of Agnes. Thus the evil that this man did lives after him."

F

V.

SUNDAY MORNING AND EVENING.

"And is it all over?"

" All over, Philip. The freshness of youth, the strength of manhood, the wisdom of maturity, the feebleness of age — all are over ; and in their place has come a calm, a repose, so deep, so profound, that, to look on the old man as he lies there this morning, you would not think he could be roused by the trumpet of the angel."

" And how died he ?"

" As the good man always dies. He called his family about him at the gray dawn of the Sabbath morning; and they came, some from tearful watching, some from deep slumber after last night's tears; and he spoke to them words of sublime and holy import; and when his voice grew feeble, he looked at them, and they said his face was radiant with the light he saw but they saw not, only as thus reflected ; and at length, as the first sun rays came across the hill and through his window, and lit the room with Sabbath lustre, he murmured, with broken voice but not unmusical,

' Oh happy harbor of God's saints,' and then died."

" What, said nothing after that ?"

" Nothing, but he looked steadfastly into heaven, as if he saw Stephen's vision ; and his white hand beat time to

SUNDAY MORNING. 83

some unheard music lon^ after he had ceased to sing. Jessie asked me, in her simple way, if I did not think he was Hstening to the angels singing ; and I smiled at her idea, but told her I thought they did not measure their songs by time in the choir that he was then ready to join."

It was Sunday morning. I had but just roused myself from long and profound sleep, and, turning to the window near my bed, had reached out my hand to throw back the curtain, when I heard the conversation which I have given. It v;as between Philip and the Doctor. The Doctor was on horseback, having returned from an early ride over to the farm-house before mentioned, and the fact that the good old farmer had gone to broader and greener fields than these was thus communicated to me.

It somewhat solemnized me that while I rested so calmly on this side of the hill he should have gone from the other ; that if the old man could have looked back as he went away, he would have seen his neighbors sleeping, forgetful of him, while he was going through such a won- drous change.

I dressed slowly and came down to breakfast, which was now ready, and with which we were admonished to hasten, as we must soon start for church over on the hill.

After a breakfast which was unusually still, even for Sunday morning, the horses were at the door before the long wagon, and we all went to the church together in the good old country fashion.

The wagon had a spring box, and the seats were cush- ioned, only the back one had a buffalo robe thrown over it, and six persons, two on a seat, rode comfortably and pleasantly in it.

The Doctor and myself had the back seat. Philip and John had the middle seat, and Sam drove with Simon

84 I GO A -FISHING.

(the blackest and best of negroes) on the seat beside him.

It was six miles to the church, up hill and down, yet mostly by a shaded road through forests. The horses jogged on slowly, for they are never hurried on a Sunday. We came up the hill toward the cross roads, where the old church stands, and as we approached, other wagons very like ours were coming in from all directions. Driv- ing up to the church door they deposited their loads, and the men took them to the shed, or to the grove of trees back of the church, and made the horses fast, to await the close of morning service.

We dismounted at the stone step, and entered the gate in front of the church together, walking through a crowd of men who congregate at the door, and wait the close of the first prayer before they enter. The custom is hea- thenish, but is as reverently observed as is the .going to church at all; and no preaching or lecturing avails to make them come in and take their seats before the serv- ice commences.

This assembly is the weekly interchange of news ; and the crops, weather, and general prospects of the season are freely discussed at the church door. This morning the death of the old farmer was the chief topic of conver- sation, and a gloom fell on all, for all loved him. It seemed as if death had come into a family, so deep was the feeling manifested by those who now first heard the news. And in the church I saw many old persons weep- ing all the morning; and why should they not weep? For he was eighty-three years their companion and friend, and if eighty years of living together in the same world, the same county, the same congregation; if eighty years of worship together in the same church, at the same altar,

A COUNTRY CHURCH, 85

be not enough to make people love one another, I am afraid that an eternity in the same heaven would not suf- fice.

Blessings on the warm country heart. There were tears shed that morning in the old church that honored the eyes that shed them ; and the pastor himself spoke with broken voice and imperfect utterance when he told them that on Tuesday afternoon the old man would be brought once again, and for the last time, into the church, and then car- ried out to sleep with the dead of the country in the old hill-side grave-yard.

The service was simple and beautiful. The first prayer was but an invocation of blessing, and after it followed the stampede into the galleries and side aisles of the men and boys who had congregated at the door.

Then followed a psalm. If you have read " The Old House by the River," you will understand me when I speak of the emotion which I feel in a country church on a calm Sabbath morning. The sound of that psalm going up peacefully to God from the little church ; the voices of the old men, broken but pleasant, joining in the song of praise ; the pleasant voices (out of time and put of tune, but in unison of heart) of the old ladies, here and there about the church; the occasional high note of an unprac- ticed child ; the clear, rich melody of a bird-like voice that is always heard somewhere in every country congregation — all these sounds are so familiar and so holy to us, that there are few places on earth so near to heaven as a seat in a country church on such a morning.

They sang rudely the psalms of the Scottish Church, but, rude though they are and rudely sung, they neverthe- less have about them forever the sanctity which the lips of martyrs gave them. They were sung when the foam

86 I GO A- FISHING.

of the inflowing tide bubbled over the lips that gave them utterance, when the flames of the chariots of fire made them more audible in heaven than on earth, when their broken S3dlables scarce prevailed to overcome the sobs and moans of earthly agony — syllables that were heard yonder, though the moans were loudest here. Yea, they are sanctified by notes of triumph that have been answered by notes of angelic welcome.

There was nothing noteworthy in the sermon. The clergyman preached specially to young children, from the text " Children, obey your parents," and I derived some good from it, though I scarcely took into my wandering brain one sentence of the whole. The good came in this wise. In the front pew, directly under the pulpit, sat a small boy, alone in one end of the pew, and he received the short, terse sentences of the minister as if each were a musket-ball. You could see him start back at each, and then he looked up wistfully once in a while and fixed his clear eyes on the wall above the pulpit, and seemed to brace himself for the next shot, but when it came it al- ways took him down with unerring force, and he shrank into his corner again. That front pew was a magic mir- ror wherein was visible a scene of far-away years. Longer ago than even the gray hairs in my beard would seem to indicate I saw a boy seated just so, and listening to a ser- mon in the old meeting-house; and the text was "Train up a child in the way he should go." Subtle and inex- plicable power of memory that should bring back out of the grave of years such an incident, long forgotten, yet now clear as the sunshine in the middle aisle. At once when the vision came the present vanished out of mind. We were no longer men in the hill-side church, but we were boys in a distant village, and the dead were living,

A VISION. 87

and the Ifving now were unborn, and the sad flood of time had all swept back and left the flowers and fields as in the long-gone days. In the pulpit stood the pastor of those days, in the pews sat the congregation of those days, in the corner pew sat the blue-eyed children of the elder, and across the aisle the black-haired boys of the other elder, and — and — and — what was that fairest of visions that beamed on me in the clear sunlight by the south win- dow? What mighty power called out of dust that form like the form of the Madonna, that face like the face of an angel ?

As I write this to-night in my library in New York, I look around me and seek in vain one connecting link between the present and the past. Not even the por- traits on the wall take me to those scenes, for portraits grow to be inhabitants themselves, and do not seem like- nesses of men and women that lived in other places. Sometimes from the face of one or the other of the Ma- donnas I catch a dreamy hint of the beautiful of the old times, and oftener perhaps the Flora, who carries her load of flowers over yonder, looks at me with a sharp, quick look, and seems to say, " Yes, I am she " — but who she is I know not.

Over there where the sunlight came in she sat in her purity, and the golden hair was brighter than the sunlight on her white shoulder. She listened, and yet did not listen, for she had always an absent look about her face, so that it seemed as if she were talking with those unseen to others. And doubtless so she was on that Sunday aft- ernoon. And the boy of whom I spoke looked at her, and he forgot the thunder of the pulpit, and, climbing on the seat, put his head through a broken place in the rail that surrounded it (the old square pew with rail and cur-

88 I GO A -FISHING.

tains), so he might look more clearly into the perfect beauty of that child's face. I always did maintain and will maintain, though it was in church, and a church of the strictest Scotch persuasion too, that the boy was wise in the pursuit of study, wiser, indeed, in studying that fair face than in listening to what he could not comprehend. The sermon was to his parents, and he was to receive its beneficial effects at second-hand. Meantime he sought the fairest and most perfect work of the Maker's hands in all the circle of his vision, and by experience knew where to look for it. It was not his fault that his ears went through the rail easily, but would not let his head come back, and that the congregation saw his situation, and the young ones first and then the old ones began to smile, and the smile became a laugh, and the end of it was that the minister stopped till he was rescued.

But all the time there was no smile on that one face at w^hich he had been looking, only a sad, anxious ex- pression, which, for the instant, took the place of the or- dinary peaceful look which rested on it. And then the sermon went on, and the singing followed, and the bene- diction after the singing, and he found her at the church door, and the two walked homeward hand in hand, and said nothing of the accident, for both had forgotten it. Happy forgetfulness of five years' old ! Happy memo- ries of half a century !

She was older than I by just five years, and very soon, as the time now seems to me, but long, long after that, as it then seemed, Katie Stuart was a maiden of exceed- ing beauty, the pride of all the country. My friend. Dr. Johnston, was a boy of that congregation, her cousin, and of just her age.

" Doctor," said I, as we drove homeward, " tell me of

KATIE STUART. 89

t.

what you thought this morning when the people came near breaking down in the singing ?"

"Have you forgotten that Abraham Stewart was the younger brother of old Deacon Stuart, who married my aunt, and who always spelled his name with the u a ?"

" No, I have not forgotten it. I have been thinking of him this morning."

" Yes ; but you did not know Katie, the darling Katie of my happiest memories. You were a child when she went away."

Not so young as the Doctor thought, but I said noth- ing, and he went on :

" I was thinking of the deacon ; and when that little break in the music occurred, I remembered how once her voice, clear and heavenly, led them all, and when the psalm was finished, I heard that voice floating away into the deep, far sky. It went before her to God. Pure as her own soul, which I sometimes think was won to heaven by the returning melody of her own songs ! There is no angel there with holier voice. I heard it this morning."

I was silent for a little, thinking, " Shall I tell him how well I remember that morning?" But I did not then, and the subject came up again in the evening, as you will learn. So I sat, and recalled a memory of the old church which was very touching that morning in con- nection with the death of farmer Stewart. Sixty years ago there was a voice in the choir that thrilled his heart every Sunday morning, so that he listened to it more than to the words of the song. He was a stout, strong man, and yet he was a child in the presence of that coun- try maiden, and he loved her with exceeding love. He served her father, not so long as Jacob for Leah, yet with no less devotion, and for a while with no more success.

90 I GO A- FISHING.

One day the farmer's family had gone to visit a friend, some ten miles distant, and, not having room in their wagon, they had returned, leaving Lucy to be sent for. And toward evening the old man — the young man, I should say — how strange this tale of his youth seems to me who have always known him as old — the young man was sent for her, and, having taken her into the wagon with him, started to return.

Five miles of the road were accomplished, when the gloom of a tempest surrounded them, and a storm burst on them with terrible fury. There was no shelter for a mile, save the old church, that stood alone on the hill, and thither he urged his horse, with difficulty and no small danger.

They reached the door, which was never closed, for the house of God in those days was always open, and the girl found shelter, while he secured the horse in safe- ty under a shed, and returned to her.

He had never told her of his love, and now was a fair opportunity. In the wild flashes of the lightning, the lit- tle church gleamed out on the valleys that it overlooked, like a silent, calm mother, to keep all safe in the war of the elements. No one who caught sight of it that night dreamed that it was occupied ; but there were two hearts in it that commenced to beat in unison that night at the altar where they pledged their love to each other. They were not afraid, not terrified, though the tempest was fear- ful, and though every window gleamed in the constant flashes of the lightning. With arms folded around each other, they knelt at the altar of the old church, and spoke to each other of the future. The storm passed on, and they knelt there still. It was a holy night, to which in after years their souls recurred with never-ceasing joy.

THE GLEN. 9 1

Yes, sneer — laugh — blaspheme that holy love, poor miserable dog of the world's whipping, who have never felt the blessedness of pure, warm, woman love, but know that for sixty years of Sabbaths while that man worship- ped God at that same altar, he never forgot that night, nor failed to thank God for that tempest.

And when they carried him into the church again, and laid him down prone at the altar foot, whereby he knelt with the maiden he loved so long ago, if his old bones revived not at the blessed touch, if his old heart thrilled not with the remembered love, if his old cheek grew not warm with the balmy breath, if his old eyes smiled not with the old, old love, if he lay there still, calm, dead, I tell you there is an altar, a church, a land, where they two kneel together, where their eyes will be radiant with love, where their lips will be eloquent with rapturous song ! Again, and yet again, I thank God for the immor- tality of love.

We reached home about two o'clock, and sat on the piazza all the afternoon, reading and talking. Before the sun went down we walked up the glen, and sat by the waterfall, where the stream dashes down some fifty feet of rock. Often in the evening gloom that cascade assumes the appearance of a female form, robed in white, sitting on the rock. The western sun shines in on the stream, and you can see the beauty of the sunset from any seat on the rocks above or below the cascade.

Abraham Stewart's son rode over to see us, and joined us in the glen. He told us all about his father's death.

The glen on such a Sunday afternoon is a place of worship. There are stones enough for sermons, but stones preach no sermons when waterfalls are nigh. Cliffs, prec- ipices, mountains, alike stand silent when the water has

92 I GO A- FISHING.

voice, all do but echo the alternate music and prayers of the stream.

For of a verity that is church-like, minster-like, cathe- dral-like— not in the dome and Sunday music, but in the calm which enters and possesses our minds. One could not laugh here ; neither could he shout aloud. Smile we can, and do, for smiles are not irreverent, nor are they necessarily out of keeping with holy places. It depends very much on what sort of a smile it is, for they vary as much as words ; but to say that a smile is always wrong in sacred places or at a sacred time, is as untrue as it would be to say that it is always wrong to speak in meet- ing, forgetting altogether the psalm, the hymn, and the prayer. Smiles in church of a Sabbath morning are not heinous sins, and no one thinking rightly would blame me for the smile on that Sunday morning in the church, for it was only the reflection on my face of the smile which came on the rugged countenance of Abraham Stewart when he died. The old man smiled ; of such smiles as that, albeit you and I have had much of happiness and hope in this world, we have never known the beatitude ; for it betokened, coming in on the close of a dark, cloud- ed day, the sunlight of the land of smiles. For such, ver- ily, is heaven, when the folding arms of the Shepherd, to whom all saints are lambs, will not be more full of de- light than the smile with which he clasps them.

John Stewart told us about the old man, and the scene in his old home on the Saturday evening. " He was a good old man," said Philip. The sound of the waterfall was louder as he spoke. Was it a change of the wind, or was it, as I sometimes think, that the God of nature teaches the winds and waters to bear testimony to the memory of his servants ? Certainly the voice of a mountain brook

ABRAHAM STEWART. 93

that I know of is always more musical and joyful when I sit by it and talk of one who loved it long ago, and whose cheerful, happy face and voice were the pride of the village church and village choir. Certainly the ocean has no such deep, full tone as when I lie on the beach, my elbow buried in the sand, and, fixing my eye on one beloved, name one who sank in the great sea, whose shout went up from a wave top, a mountain summit of the waters, whereon uplifted he caught the view of heaven sometimes granted to those about to die, and whence he escaped into its peace. Certainly the wind has no such voice, no such tone of perfect music, as it used to have among the pines around the Old House, while Joe Willis and I sat at the library window of a September evening and thought of the beloved dead ; for we had but to think of them and the wind knew our thoughts up there — on my faith, it did. I never had a sad thought or a glad one there that the wind did not seem to know of

I am certain that the waterfall had a louder voice when Philip said that Abraham Stewart was a good old man. His record is above. He has gone to read it there. We read it here, and I add my line of praise to those which the hearts of the inhabitants of that country-place have long preserved.

Yes, he died gloriously ; with a smile and a shout, and the voice of shouting like the voice of many waters, which they who stood beside him heard, or thought they heard, audibly from the assembly of saints and martyrs into which he passed. He sang the words of a psalm in the evening before he died, and Jessie, the child, took up the words, and ignorant that her grandfather was departing into the solemn company of those who had sung the psalm in other years in flame and flood, her voice rang

94 I GO A- FISHING.

out on the hushed air, and sounded in heaven, where they kept silence to listen.

The dying man turned his blue eyes lovingly toward the window where his darling sat, and listened while she sang ; and when she came again to the words which are repeated so many times in the psalm, he joined with full though low voice, and motioned to all who were around him, and they joined also in the sublime chorus :

"Oh that men to the Lord would give praise for his goodness then, And for his works of wonder done unto the sons of men !"

And then all hushed, and Jessie, nothing abashed, with clear, bird-like voice went on, and sang of those that go down to the sea in ships, and do business on the great waters, nor thought of the ocean that was even then roll- ing around her so tempestuously, on whose billows the old man was tossed. All was silent while she sang. But her grandfather seemed restless, and, manifestly, the heaven of his hopes at times was shut out from his vision. But when at length the child sang of the calm, the quiet, and stillness which the voice of God commanded, and how finally he brings them who are troubled unto rest, them who are tempest-tossed unto their desired haven, the old man grew quiet, his face assumed the smile again, his lip grew serenely calm, his eye lustrous, but with the soft lustre of a star on a clear night in the mountain country, and again, but now with loud, distinct voice, full of cheer, he joined the chorus,

" Oh that men to the Lord would give praise for his goodness then !"

It were vain with human words to attempt a description of the passage from darkness to light, the breaking in on the scenes of earth of that all-holy radiance, whereof the

AMERICAN LUXURY. 95

Sabbath sunshine, falling among the pearls of the Fall, and reflected to our eyes in the effulgence of the bow of prom- ise, is only a faint type, worthy of being such only because both are his glory who made both. Let us thank God that the promise is as unfailing as its glorious seal, on passing thunder cloud, on April tears, on the cataract's bosom, on the gleaming waterfall, that sits on the rock and laves her flashing feet in the pool below, forever sure, in tears or laughter, sun or storm, the promise that there shall be no more flood. Oh man, clinging to the last stem of hope while the stream of life rushes tumultuously downward, hear the voice of promise ! Oh man, whose eye is dim with watching, seated alone and lonesome on the wreck of life, while the tide rises and the waves swell around, know that though the tempest be furious, there shall be no more flood ! Abraham Stewart found the promise sure, and when the flood was gathering, he smiled, and when he lay dead there was a smile on his face that did not seem to rest there, but it was as if the light of heaven, shining on it, were now and then intercepted by the swift wings of attending angels.

As the night came down we went home and dined. What would life be, in cottage or camp, in labor or sport, without dinner ?

"What a luxurious race we Americans are getting to be," said Steenburger, as we sat smoking in the library, where a cheery fire made the atmosphere conversational. "We surpass the days of that splendid extravagance in Rome, which history seems to regard as unequaled. Look at it. We have dined together here, and it was a plain, ordinary dinner. We had a piece of lamb from the home farm, but I think that was the solitary American dish on the table. The spices were of all the world ; the sauces

96 I GO A-FISHING.

were made in England; the vegetables, peas, and toma- toes grew a thousand miles off in Bermuda ; the ancho- vies came from the Baltic ; the olives from the Mediter- ranean ; the wine — Where did that red wine come from, Philip ?"

Philip. " From the remotest borders of Europe. It is the only Hungarian wine I ever drank that I liked. It is Turkenblud, the blood of the Turks, and only one vine- yard grows that quality. The Effendi here sent to Hun- gary for it."

Steenburger. " We have had red wine from the land of the ancient Scythians, and white wine from the banks of the Rhine. The coffee was a mixture of Mocha and Java — Africa and the far Indies united for us to concoct that tiny cup of beverage. The cup itself came from China, made there two hundred years ago; no modern work resembles that old ware; and the dinner was served on dishes made in France, three thousand miles off across the Atlantic. The fruits were from Havana ; there were even some dates from Barbary, or the Eastern Mediter- ranean, I don't know which."

Philip. "They came from Mecca; Mohammed Abd- el-Atti sent a skin of them to the Effendi, and rightly said there are no such dates to be found out of Araby the Blessed."

Steenburger. " There sits the Doctor, still sipping his little glass of Chartreuse from a convent in the heart of Europe. What had the Romans to compare with this, a common American dinner in New York? Your par- don, Philip — it was a good dinner, but nothing extraor- dinary."

Philip. "You have not half enumerated the foreign contributions to your feast. The table, the chairs, the

COMMERCE. 97

table-cloths, and the napkins — pretty much all the arti- cles on the table are of foreign wood or foreign make. The knives are of steel, manufactured in England from iron dug in Sweden; and the handles are ivory, hunted in the jungles of Ethiopia. You are smoking at this mo- ment a cigar from Cuba, and I am smoking the tobacco of the slopes of Lebanon, in a pipe made at Es-Siout, in Egypt, with a stem of jessamine from Asia, and an am- ber mouth-piece from the shores of the Baltic Sea."

The Doctor. "Life in an American house is some- thing like this library — a gathering of the labor and in- tellect of all nations and all times. What an atmosphere to live in ! A sweep of your eye carries you through centuries."

Philip. " But this is not mere luxury after all. These contributions of the world to our comfort are cheaper by far than the same articles could be made here at home. The poor and the rich alike experience the benefits of modern commerce. The grand feature of our age is that the industry of all the world is made, by the power of commerce, to contribute to the comfort of mankind in every separate part of the sphere. The whole world now^ works for each individual man, to clothe and feed him, and make him happy. There are some who, arguing from the money-making point of view, think it better to forbid the contributions of foreign labor to the inhabitants of each country. They would have England, France, China, Prussia, Persia, America, each exclude the labor of the other from its soil. The policy carried out would pro- tect home labor with a vengeance ! It would make the laborer's clothes, and tea and coffee and sugar, and even his bread, in each country so costly that he must econo- mize more on five dollars a day than he ever used to do

G

98 I GO A- FISHING.

on two. But this talk is verging on politics. What are you reading there, John ?"

Steenburger. "An old hymn-book. You have a queer lot of books lying around here."

The Doctor. " An old hymn is a great thing. What voices have sung it ! An old hymn-book is suggestive — what emotion it bears record of! I very often find rest in reading old hymns. It is only once in a great while that I have a sensation. I've almost outgrown sensa- tions. When I was fifty years old I thought it over, and concluded that I had worn out the sensational possibili- ties of my soul. But an old hymn to an old tune con- vinced me I was mistaken. One evening last winter in London I was passing a church in some street when I heard a strain of familiar music, and I stopped short/ just in time to catch the last words of a verse in the hymn they were singing. Why, Philip, they speak of the war- horse starting at the sound of the trumpet. So my old heart started at the sound of that hymn and music."

Myself. " I understand you. Once I was walking listlessly of a Sunday afternoon through the narrow streets of Cairo, the heart of the Orient to this day as in the days of the Caliphs. I came accidentally near the house where some missionaries reside, and where they and their families were holding service. Out on the strange atmosphere of the old city, whose every stone and lattice and whose very sky were mysterious, old, and incomprehensible, floated with perfect distinctness the words of an old hymn. In an instant I was carried away to the church in the up-country village, and I leaned against the wall of a house, and thought and thought and thought, till the misty condition of my eyes reminded me where I was. And that wasn't half so powerful a sensa-

OLD HYMNS. 99

tion as I had some months later. I never knew a more tempestuous night, for a starry one, than I had in Upper Egypt, when a fierce gale carried my boat through the pass at Hagar Silsilis. About nine o'clock in the even- ing I was standing on deck, watching the stars and list- ening to the rush of the boat through the brown Nile, swinging and swaying her great sail as she dashed along. Suddenly I caught on the wind the strain of an old tune, and I saw that we were passing a boat which lay near the shore. There were Americans on board, and the very words of the hymn came clearly to my ear; or else I imagined them. It was a startling interruption to the wildness of the scene. My Arabs were as heedless of it as of the wind. They lay on deck wrapped up in their bournooses, slumbering heavily. The Nubian pilot stood firm at the helm. But to me the sound was like a voice out of the very sky. What I saw in the next moment's imagination it would take hours to tell. We think swift- ly. You spoke to me this morning of Deacon Stuart, Doctor.

Steenburger {uiaking from a dose). " Deacon Stuart ! What — here ? I thought he was in glory forty years ago."

Myself. " Not quite so long, as we count time in this slow world. But twenty-five years ago they buried the good man, then full of years, ready to go, and ripe for heaven. No, he is not coming here to-night, John ; but if he didn't come to my Nile boat that night with his grand- daughter Kate, then all I can say is that I had a powerful imagination. The Doctor told me this morning that I was too young to remember Katie Stuart. Old friend, I had been looking into her brown eyes all the morning service time — looking through forty years of storm and through six feet of heavy earth. I not remember Katie !

lOO I GO A -FISHING.

Why she was the prettiest girl in the whole congrega- tion— older than I ; but I used to look at her in church and wonder if any thing more beautiful was ever seen in any age or land. When I read of Helen and Cleopatra and Lucretia, and all the beauties of old times, it was al- ways with the notion that each one, blonde or brune, must have looked like Katie Stuart. And a boy's impressions of that kind last him for life. And that night that I was telling of, driving up the Nile before the northern gale, when I passed the American boat and heard the sound of a hymn, I saw in an instant the old church on that very Sunday morning that you were thinking of, Doctor ; and all that scene came back to me, for they were sing- ing on that Nile boat the same hymn which I always re- member as the last song of Katie Stuart.

" The church was unusually full that morning, for there had been two deaths in the previous week, and a funeral sermon was expected. The day was bitterly cold. The thermometer was twenty degrees below zero all day. I remember how much emotion was visible in the church, for the deaths had been those of )'oung persons very much loved, and there had been a story that one of them, a fine fellow, but long failing, had loved Katie Stuart very dearly. Whether she knew it or not no one could say. But when the minister had finished a touching sermon, leaving young and old in tears, and gave out the hymn to sing, it was hard work to sing it. The precentor got along tolerably well till he came to the beginning of a verse where he found almost no one to help him, and he sang the first three or four notes with only two or three voices accom- panying him, and then he broke down with a sort of sob. Then — I can hear it now — how delicious, how glorious it was ! — Katie Stuart's voice, clear as a bird's, floated up, as

MEMORY OF RHYME. lOI

if she were inspired, and the very atmosphere was filled with its melody as she sang :

* I would begin the music here

And so my soul should rise : Oh, for some heavenly notes to bear My passions to the skies !'

It was five miles from the church to the deacon's farm. The old man drove, and Katie sat wrapped in buffalo robes by his side in the sleigh. I remember the black horses well. When they started I was looking at her face. I had watched her .from the close of the service. She spoke to no one, but went directly to the sleigh, quietly let her grandfather wrap the robes around her, re- mained silent, and the horses went off at a bound. What the deacon thought of all the way home no one can im- agine, but when he reached home Katie had gone far away. She was sitting wrapped in the robes with a smil- ing face, but cold and calm and dead in the sleigh. That hymn was her last utterance in our language, which, make it as passionate as we may, does not, can not remotely imitate the songs they sing up yonder."

The Doctor. " It is plain to me that some of our most- vivid memories, or, rather, our recollections, are caused by familiar sounds, especially musical sounds. We remem- ber rhyme much more easily than prose or blank verse."

Steenburger. " Yes ; I often find a rhyming lot of words wandering in my brain, and can't tell where they come from. I know only that they have been stowed away somewhere there for a great many years. Often Greek and Latin rhymes run through my mind of which I have absolutely forgotten, if I ever knew, the meaning. It is thirty years since I played tag with boys, but to this hour I remember the senseless ' Anor manor monar mike,'

I02 I GO A -FISHING.

and so on, which we used for choosing a runner ; and Latin hymns are always more firmly fixed in my memory than English."

The Doctor. "Philip, you were abusing the 'Dies Irae' the other day."

Philip. " Not abusing, Doctor ; I was differing from you when you spoke of it as the finest of the mediaeval hymns."

The Doctor. " That is abuse. It's always acknowl- edged to be the finest."

Philip. " So you said."

The Doctor. " Don't you believe it ?"

Philip. " I told you no."

The Doctor. "Why not, man? Speak out. You aren't used to be afraid to express an opinion."

Philip. " My good fellow, don't bother about my opin- ions. You and John agree about the 'Dies Irae,' and want to drag me into a debate."

Steenburger. " Not a bit of it, Phil ; but you will con- fess it is a remarkably strong piece of Latin rhyme ; the most musical, in fact, that we have."

Philip. " I disagree with you ; and, since you will have it, I'll give you my opinion in plain words. I think the 'Dies Irae' has a reputation founded on but little. Its long use in the Christian world as a funeral hymn has made it almost sacred. But if produced now for the first time it would be justly and severely criticised. The Latin is bad, of course, because it is mediaeval. The expressions are variable — sometimes very strong, sometimes weak, some- times worse than weak. The rhymes are abominable."

Steenburger {^starting up). " What do you mean by that? They're the finest rhymes conceivable."

Philip. "John, do me the favor to open that Breviary

THE DIES IR^. 103

yonder. It's old, and contains an early copy of the ' Dies Irae.' Just read the rhyming words of the fourth stanza aloud, will you ?"

Steenburger {reads). ^^JVatura, creatura, respojtsura.^^ Philip. " Do you call those rhyming words ? Now try the seventh."

Steenburger {reads). ^'•Dicturus, rogaturus, securus." Philip. "Two terminations identical in both stanzas, and of course no rhyme. In the eighth you will find tatis and tatis ; in the eleventh tionis and tionis ; in the thir- teenth audisti rhymes with dedisti ; and the fifteenth is ab- solutely destitute of rhyme, the terminations being /r^j-/a, qiiestra^ and dextra, neither of which rhymes with anoth- er. The sixteenth stanza has three lines ending in dictis. Now observe, John, Horace could write very good Latin without rhyme, but, if he had ever attempted to rhyme, he would not have accomplished it by repeating the same syllables. For the purposes of rhyme, the 'Dies Irae' is not to be praised. As to the Latin, I fancy you don't need my criticism. You were always a better Latin schol- ar than I, and you know that there is very poor Latin, and a very weak construction in the whole hymn. The sonorous character of the hymn in a foreign language, where the thought fails to follow the sense, alone saves it from condemnation. And, I confess, that the English translation of the hymn by our lamented friend, Slosson, is, to my notion, a better poem than the original Latin. And it is the most truthful, as well as the most musical translation I know of."

The Doctor. "The last stanza always bothered me." Philip. "I suppose that Thomas de Celano did not write that stanza. It appears to have been a later addi- tion ; and I incline to think that it has been changed by

I04 I GO A- FISHING.

some copyist so as to destroy the sense. A single letter dropped has apparently weakened the original force of the stanza. Read it, John." Steenburger {reads) :

"■ Lacrymosa dies ilia ! Qua resurget ex favilla Judicandus homo reus ; Huic ergo parce Deus !"

Philip. " Now, John, tell me what is the force and value of that word ergo in the last line ? To my notion, it never implied any thing else in Latin than the plain English word ' therefore.' But, if you read it therefore, it is a senseless word in this line, referring to nothing. The lit- eral translation of the stanza, as it now stands, is this : ' Oh, that day of weeping, in which guilty man shall rise from the ashes to be judged : therefore, spare him, oh God.' Now this is a very inconsequential sentence. Read it in this way :

* Lacrymosa dies ilia ! Quae resurget ex favilla ? Judicandus homo reus ! Huic ergo parce Deus !'

There you have an intelligible and a strong passage, with full force to your ergo. ' Oh, that mournful day ! What shall arise out of the ashes ? Guilty man to be judged ! Him therefore spare, oh God.' The idea is, that he, and only he, will arise from the terrors of the wrath which will consume all earthly things ; and because he is the only thing permitted to arise, therefore mercy is im- plored for this solitary subject left undestroyed."

The Doctor. "It sounds reasonable. Go on, Philip." Philip. " With what ? I've done with the ' Dies.' " The Doctor. "What is the best of the Latin hymns in your opinion, Effendi ? Give us your ideas on that."

THE SWAN SONG.

105

Myself. " I could not answer that question, Doctor. In my library, in various volumes, are many hundred medi- aeval Latin hymns. Some books of the 15th and i6th cen- turies I have preserved only because they contained some- times one or two Latin hymns ; many of which, I think, must have been unknown to Daniel and to Mone, and other collectors, for they are worthy a place in any collec- tion. The number is inexhaustible. When I have- a fa- vorite, it lasts me but a week or two, and another takes its place. You could no more say which is the finest, than you could say which is the finest of our English hymns. One may seem more musical, one more strong or nervous, one more sonorous, one more pathetic, one more solemn, and so on. But even in each characteristic there are nu- merous rivals, and much depends on your own state of mind at the time of reading a hymn."

Steenburger. " Effendi, I heard you once, years ago, speak of one which you called 'The Swan Song.' What was it ?"

Myself. "Very curious and very beautiful; the author and period unknown ; but it has as much poetic fire and imagination in it as any Latin song I know. It is not a hymn at all. It is the wail of a dying voluptuary. Queerly enough, it reminds me at times of some of the eloquence of Augustine. Philip has it. I gave him a copy once."

Philip. "Yes. You will find it in that book with a red back on the third shelf, near the side. That's it. Get it out John, and read."

Steenburger (reads) :

"CYGNUS EXSPIRANS.

" Parendum est, cedendum est, Claudenda vitae scena ; Est jacta sors, me vocat mors,

I06 I GO A-FISHING.

Haec hora est postrema : Valete res, valete spes ; Sic finit cantilena.

" O magna lux, sol, mundi dux. Est concedendum fatis ; Due lineam eclipticam, Mihi luxisti satis : Nox incubat ; fax occidit ; Jam portum subit ratis.

" Tu Cynthia argentea, Vos, aurei planetae. Cum stellulis, ocellulis, Nepotibus lucete ; Fatalia, letalia Me nunciant cometae.

*' Ter centies, ter millies Vale, immunde munde ! Instabilis et labilis, Vale, orbis rotunde ! Mendaciis, fallaciis Lusisti me abunde."

The Doctor. "What a superb line that is? Vale itn- mimde fftunde f Goon, John.'' Steenburger {reads) :

" Lucentia, fulgentia Gemmis valete tecta, Seu marmore, seu ebore Supra nubes erecta. Ad parvulum me loculum Mors urget equis vecta.

" Lucretiae, quae specie Gypsata me cepistis, Imagines, voragines ! Quae mentem sorbuistis, En oculos, heu ! scopulos, Extinguit umbra tristis.

CYGNUS EXSPIRANS. IO7

" Tripudia, diludia, Et fescennini chori, Quiescite, raucescite ; Praeco divini fori, Mors, intonat et insonat Hunc lessum ; Debes mori.

" Deliciae, lautitiae Mensarum cum culina ; Cellaria, bellaria, Et coroiiata vina, Vos nauseo, dum haurio Quern scyphum mors propinat.

" Facessite, putrescite Odores, vestimenta ; Rigescite deliciae. Libidinum fomenta ! Deformium me vermium Manent operimenta.

" O culmina, heu ! fulmina, H or urn fugax honorum. Tarn subito dum subeo ^ternitatis domum, Ridiculi sunt tituli ; Foris et agunt momum.

" Lectissimi, carissimi Amici et sodales. Heu ! insolens et impudens Mors interturbat sales. Sat lusibus indulsimus ; Extremum dico vale !

" Tu denique, corpus, vale, Te, te citabit forum ; Te conscium, te socium Dolorum et gaudiorum ! ^qualis nos expectat sors — Bonorum vel malorum."

Steenburger {laying dow?i the book). "Why, that is the

Io8 I GO A-FISHING.

most musical and mournful, as well as the strongest bit of Latin rhyme I ever read — and the Latin is good, too — that's the oddest thing about it. Who made it ?"

Philip. "Ignotus."

Steenburger. " An unknown man ? Strange, isn't it, that so many men are known who ought to be unknown, and so many are unknown that one would give all his old boots to know ?"

VI.

AN EXPLORING EXPEDITION.

There is a lake over the mountains, some forty miles from the Rookery, which I had long desired to see ; but I could never persuade a friend to go with me on an ex- ploring expedition. A recent extension of the railway had made it somewhat more accessible, if I was to give credit to the information given me by a baggage-master, who assured me that the railroad crossed an old wood- road which led in three or four miles to the lake.

There is, I think, a love of novelty in all anglers. We prefer to fish new waters when we can, and it is some- times pleasanter to explore, even without success, than to take fish in familiar places. New and fine scenery is al- ways worth finding. But I could not beat these ideas practically into the brain of either Steenburger or Doctor Johnston, and I resolved therefore on a solitary expedi- tion to the lake.

I had not then, what I now possess, and strongly rec- ommend to roving anglers, a patent India-rubber raft, made in two cylinders, with a light frame to sit on. This boat or raft, packing in a small compass when not "blown up," weighs less than fifty pounds, and can be carried on a man's shoulders to any lake or pond. I have frequently used it on water never before fished, and to reach which it was necessary to climb hills so steep

no I GO A -FISHING.

and so covered with alternate rock and under-brush that two men would have found it quite impossible to carry up safely any boat, however light. An axe and an auger wherewith to build a raft were therefore essentials to my equipment, and these, with some hard bread and sand- wiches, and one heavy and one light fly-rod, made up the sum total of my luggage.

Taking the forenoon accommodation train up the road, I went forward to find my old informant, the baggage- master, or, if not him, some other one who could supple- ment my scanty knowledge of the locality I was seeking.

Luckily there was a man who said he knew all about it, and, after riding forty miles or so, the conductor stop- ped his train at a road crossing in the woods, I tumbled out, and civilization at once departed from me, drawn by the power of steam.

It had been a sudden idea, and the realization was somewhat discouraging. Alone in the woods, wdth sun- dry traps in the way of luggage, and with no other guide than the words of the confident individual I had met on the cars, who said that the lake lay at the foot of a hill to which he pointed across the forest, I set out, and aft- er a half-mile tramp came on the traces of a clearing, and, soon descending into a hollow, found a saw-mill. Two men who were running it were evidently astonished at the appearance of a traveler, but they very good-nat- uredly offered advice, to wit, that, if one wanted trout- fishing, he could find it then and there in the mill-dam, but that if he went to the lake he would find no trout, for nobody ever could take trout there except through the ice in the winter.

" What size do they take them, then .?"

" Oh, sometimes five or six pounds."

THE UNKNOWN LAKE. Ill

This was the same story I had heard at a distance, and it confirmed my hopes. I chatted a while with the sawyers, and tried the contents of their pond. A few casts brought up some small trout, and at length a very decent fish, perhaps a pound in weight, rose to the scar- let ibis. Landing him, and leaving him with the others for the use of the men, who had never before seen fly- fishing, and were astonished at the process, I pushed on in the afternoon toward the unknown lake or pond. The road became less a road and more a path as it ascended hill after hill, winding and pleasant, but always tending upward. At last it opened on a large clearing where stood a ruined log house, deserted long ago, and a tol- erably decent barn, in which there was a small quantity of dry hay. This was an unexpected luxury, for I had calculated on a night in camp. I took possession of the only tenantable end of the log house, deposited my pack- ages, and resolved to make this my head-quarters, since it was evident the lake was distant not over a mile at most. Then taking a light rod I plunged into the forest, and in less than half an hour emerged on the banks of the lake. It lacked an hour of sunset, and there was but little time for the examination of the shores. Boat there was none. The unbroken forest surrounded the sheet of water. There was no time this evening to con- struct a raft, and if I was to have trout for supper, it must be by casting from the shore, and so I went to work at once.

In visiting a new lake like this, the chances are always against the fisherman. He knows nothing of the special haunts of the trout, and can form no opinion of the shape of the bottom of the pond — an idea of which is generally necessary to guide one in looking for this fish. The

112 I GO A-FISHING.

safest rule is therefore to seek for the main inlet, and, if the water is here found shoal, to wade out far enough to get a cast over deeper water. Beginning on this rule, I had a long hunt for the inlet, and it was after sunset before I found it. It happened fortunately that there was an accumulation here of old drift-wood, well packed together, which supported me, and I had a good clear back cast. For ten or fifteen minutes it was all vain work. Nothing broke the surface which had life. The gloom began to settle on the lake. It grew cold withal, and the wind was sharp. I frankly confess that by this time I wanted fish because I was hungry. If supper were to be confined to three or four pieces of hard bread, it was not to be regarded with any earnest longings and joyous anticipations. If, on the other hand, I could look to the rich salmon-colored meat of a trout as waiting me in the old log house, it was something worth thinking about.

And as I thought about it, he rose with a heavy rush, and slashed the tail-fly with his own broad tail and went down again. Cast after cast, and he would not rise again. So I fell back at last on the old white moth, and, taking off all the other flies, cast this alone, in the twilight which was now almost darkness. He came up at it at the first cast, and took it, head on, following the fly from behind. It is not often on still water that a trout takes a fly with his mouth before striking it with his tail ; but they some- times do it on a white fly in the evening, and from this fact it seems likely that they regard it as an animal mov- ing in the water and not as a fly at all.

He took it and turned down, then, as he felt the hook, swayed off with a long, steady surge, and circled half around me. Supper was tolerably certain now, and my

SALT. 113

appetite at once rose. In less than five minutes I had him, a good, solid three-pounder, in the landing-net, and at once struck a bee line for the log house in the clearing.

The cabin was nothing to boast of as a shelter. The roof was tight over the end opposite the chimney, but the windows were destitute of glass, and the breeze, which had sprung up freshly before I left the lake, was talking loudly to itself inside of the place as I approached it. There was plenty of wood around the old hut, and in ten minutes I had the chimney blazing at a terrible rate. Fire-light is as much of a polisher in-doors as moonlight outside. It smoothes down all the roughness of an in- terior. It reddened the walls of the cabin and covered them with dancing images. I had nothing in the way of eatables except the trout, hard bread, and some salt. The salt was the great article. It was on the faith of that salt that I had ventured on the expedition. With a few pinch- es of salt and a good rod or gun, one may live luxuriously for a while, if he have luck. Without the salt — only im- agine it. You may not think much of it as a thing to possess, but just reverse the picture and imagine fish and game in abundance without it, and you may thereby find in some measure what it is worth.

I recall oftentimes a scene at Wady Halfe where the palms of Ethiopia bear golden fruit, but where salt is worth more than golden dates. There I have bought bushels of luxurious fruit for a single handful of the con- densed brine from the far-off sea.

One half of the trout was turning before the blaze, hung on the small end of a birch sapling ; the other half was reserved for breakfast, for it was by no means certain that any other food was to be found. A pile of hay from the barn made a soft bed in the sheltered end of the room.

H

114 I GO A-FISHING.

While the fire burned I mused, and before the musings had assumed form the trout was cooked, and then my supper was ready and -eaten, the bed looked more and more inviting, and by nine or ten o'clock I was sound asleep in the corner.

Morning found me sleeping. The sun and air were streaming in at the window-frames innocent of sash or glass. But while the question of breakfast was under discussion, a voice came in by the same avenues with the sunshine and wind, singing a cheery song, and I saw the tall form of one of the sawyers of the mill swinging along toward the wood in the direction of the lake. He pulled up at a hail and turned to the cabin.

" Glad to see you lively this morning," he said in a hearty voice. " I thought I'd come over and bring you suthin' to eat; expected to find you in camp, down along the pond." Then, entering the cabin and seeing the half of the last night's trout hanging before the fire — " Well, you seem to ha' taken care of yourself. You don't say you got that feller last night with one of them little poles o' yourn?"

We made a substantial meal together at once, and the best thanks that could be given my friend were visible in the justice done to his corn-bread and hard eggs. He had come three miles across the country on this hospi- table errand, and was delighted when I proposed to him to spend the day on the lake, and promised to go home with him in the evening.

The first work was the building of a raft. To the un- initiated it is often a puzzle how rafts are constructed by fishermen in the forests, and possibly there are not many sportsmen who have regarded an axe and an auger as parts of an outfit. The two things are essential to a for-

THE YELLOW FLY. II5

est expedition, and in going to fish an unknown sheet of water one might almost as well leave his rod behind him as these tools. There are ways of getting on without the auger, but a raft lashed together with withes is a danger- ous craft. I have had such a one part with me in mid- lake, while I swam ashore with my rod in my hand, los- ing even the fish I had taken. In the present case I had both tools. The construction of the raft was very simple. Two pine-trees supplied six logs, each about a foot in di- ameter, which were rolled into the water and floated side by side, a few inches apart. Across these smaller tim- bers were laid, the axe shaping them down fiat where wooden pegs were driven in auger-holes through them into the heavy logs. It was but little over an hour's work to complete it, for the timber was at hand in good size and quantity. Then we covered the raft with balsam boughs, to stand or sit or lie down on, and a couple of long poles finished the furniture of the vessel on which we pushed out at the inlet of the lake. The day was so much more beautiful than the previous one that the lake appeared like a new place, and the trout were rising on the surface here and there in a way which indicated that the warm sunshine had brought out some small flies, in- visible to the eye at a distance, but satisfactory as indi- cating that the fish were on the feed. It was nearly ten o'clock when I began casting. But nothing rose to my flies till I had changed them twice or oftener, and had on at length three small gnats, a dun, a yellow, and a black, and then came the first strike at the yellow, a half-pound fish soon killed. Another at the yellow again, a some- what larger fish, gave me some slight work, and a third took the yellow once more, and thereupon I changed : the dropper yellow, the tail-fly yellow, and intermediate a

Il6 I GO A -FISHING.

small scarlet ibis. The first cast made with this new bank, as some men call the arrangement, cost me the scarlet fly. A large fish took the dropper, and at the same instant another struck the ibis. They headed in opposite directions, and the very stroke of the two parted the slender thread. I landed but one on that cast, and only once after that had two at the same time, and then saved them both.

The sport continued good till about one o'clock, and then ceased. The breeze rippled the water, the flies were increasing in number in the warm sunshine, but feeding time was over and the fish went down. I have seen the same thing often on other waters.

The object of the expedition was accomplished. There were trout in the lake — they would rise to the fly. Over a dozen beautiful large fish, and nearly another dozen which ran below a half pound each, were fair eyidence of the contents of this water. Six of the smaller fish had been taken with bait by my friend, the sawyer. He had cut a birch rod, and with hook and line which I sup- plied, and the fin of a trout for bait, which he kept con- stantly moving near the bottom of the lake, he had cap- tured a half-dozen fair-sized fish.

So we left the raft to drift toward the leeward side of the lake, and started for the log house in the clearing ; and thence, carrying heavy weight, we trudged over the hills to the home of my friend of the mill.

It is one of the most pleasant incidents, not uncommon either, in the life of a roving angler, to find the hospitality of a warm American country home. There is no other country in the world where such incidents can happen, for nowhere else are there outlying farms and homes in the forest, in which one can meet with that measure of

A FARM-HOUSE STORY. II7

refinement and cultivation which marks American farm- ers' famines. Books, magazines, and newspapers find their way into the remotest settlements, and it is a pleas- ing fact that newness or freshness in the literature is not an essential to its enjoyment. Life glides on so evenly that there is no thirst for novelty, no excitement which requires peculiar stimulus. It is the custom of many an- glers whom I know to gather in the autumn all their old magazines and literature of various kinds, and send it to such distant homes in the forest, where it helps the winter through, and where the giver finds, and is sometimes glad to find it in the spring.

My sawyer friend brought me to such a house. The fire-light was shining from the kitchen hearth through the open door as we approached, and an old woman, with a bright and sunny smile on her face, welcomed her son and his guest on the threshold. The two lived together here, in a snug frame house, low down in the valley, and only a half-mile from the open country where was a small village and a church. " If it were daylight, you could see the church," said the old lady, " but as it is you can only see the lights in Alice Brand's farm-house."

And later in the evening, after we had dined, or supped, royally, and were sitting before the hearth talking of this, that, and the other thing, the old lady told me a story about Alice Brand's farm-house.

Forty years ago Stephen Brand was a farmer in the valley near the church, well to do in the world, and, as he hoped, with some treasure laid up where it could not cor- rupt. At all events Stephen was a light in the church, and had been a judge, or something of the sort, in his county. For a long time the stout old man had served his country, and he was beginning to be weary.

Il8 I GO A -FISHING.

He had one son ; but Walter Brand, the child of his old age, was a wanderer, and his wife Alice, the daughter of the clergyman, lived in the old house with Stephen, and cared for him and superintended the domestic duties of the home-farm.

Alice had been a favorite in the village before her mar- riage, and most persons thought well of the match ; but Walter was a restless boy, and although sole heir to his father's wealth, which was not small, and although he had a gentle wife at home that loved him truly and fondly, he yet preferred to rove, and seldom returned to the old place under the elms.

They had one child. He was a boy, and from his birth was so like the old man that you were startled and almost frightened at the strange resemblance. There was an old look on the child's face that grew tenfold older every year that he lived, and when he was seven, you might have taken his countenance for that of a man of seventy. He was hopelessly deformed. This sorrowful truth began to force itself on the mother's mind before he was two years old, and at length there could be no doubt of the fact. Like all deformed children of tender-hearted parents, he was far more dear to his mother on this very account, and she cherished him as a very gem lost out of heaven and found by them. And such he was. There was a depth of quiet beauty in his childish soul that passed all sound- ing. No one seemed to penetrate its mysteries except the old man, his grandfather, and he would sit for hours looking into the large black eyes of the boy, and appar- ently gazing into the very soul of his pet. They grew to each other. The old man for his sake came half way back to his childhood and met him — for the boy seemed to be half way to old age, even at six years old. Alice

A FARM-HOUSE STORY. II9

was happy in that growing love, and watched them with eyes full of tears at the thought that ere long the old man must go down to silence, and the boy live on alone.

Sometimes they would walk together, and sit down un- der a tree on the river bank and talk. No one knew what they talked of in such moments, but doubtless the grandfather had visions of the world he was entering, and communicated them to the boy. And so years traveled along, and they all grew older together, and when once in a while Walter came back, the house was happy.

But a change came. The cheek of Stephen Brand grew paler and paler as he grew more feeble, and he felt that the hour was approaching when he must go away by the dark road ; and the boy's life was so knitted to that of his grandfather, that he too seemed visibly to fail from day to day. It was a curious circumstance, and did not fail to attract the attention of the family and the neighbor- hood, and wise old women prophesied that the boy would not outlive the old man.

And now the two talked constantly and steadily from morning till night and late into the night. Sometimes they were seated by the fire in the old hearth, sometimes in the large chairs facing each other that stood in Stephen's room, and as the spring advanced they sat sometimes under the large elm that was near the well, and oftener still on the river bank by the spring. And their conver- sation was no secret, but was of the high and blessed promises for the future, of the light that shone all along that otherwise dark sad road they were traveling. Alice wept in secret every day, but never let them see her tears. She went cheerfully about her household work, and in the dull routine of a farmer's life sought to forget the bitter- ness of the coming separation.

I20 I GO A-FISHING.

It came at length. One pleasant morning in the sum- mer, when the birds sang with unusual cheer, and sky and earth seemed to come close together in their affection, the inseparable two walked feebly out together, and down to the old seat on the river bank. Alice was alarmed about them, and followed them herself, but when she saw them seated safely she returned and worked sadly on until noon. But they did not return as usual, and she hasten- ed down the pathway across the field, and sought them by the spring. But they were not there. A wild terror seized on her, and she sank trembling on the seat beside the old man's hat which lay on it. A brief search reveal- ed the sad story. The boy had sought something in the edge of the water, and in his feebleness had fallen. The old man had tried to rescue him, and perished with him. The two were found together, and together carried to the old farm-house, out of which the lights had now forever gone.

"• Ah," said the old lady, " I've heard the passing-bell many, many times in the valley, but I never heard it sound so strange as it did that afternoon when it came up the valley and I counted it. It was ever so long be- fore I got to eighty-seven, and then I knew that Stephen Brand was gone, and I was just thinking how lonesome poor little Steve would be, when it struck again. Upon my word, sir, it almost knocked me off my chair; and when I counted fourteen, I just sat here trembling all over, and then I fell to crying like any child."

" Mrs. Brand still lives on the farm, I suppose ?"

" Alice, you mean ? Oh yes. The death of the two who had been so close to her was a heavy affliction, and she was pretty much broken down; but it brought a blessing that repaid her, for Walter came home at once.

GHOSTS. 121

and somehow their old love sprang up again quite fresh, and he did not go away, and they settled down into a happy sort of life. They're living in the old house now. It's Alice's, for the old man left it to her and not to Wal- ter. He'd be glad to see you, sir. It isn't often he hears from his old friends in the city. She's my cousin, Alice is. Sam, why don't you walk down to the farm and see Walter ? It'll do him good, for he's getting old and growing stiff. Sam, you're not afraid of ghosts ?"

" No, no, I thank you. I'm too content with your hos- pitality to go away from it to-night," I said, in reply to Sam's proffer of an escort for the call. But I noticed that it was the allusion to ghosts that had started him out of his easy seat, and I looked for an explanation.

" It's not strange," said my hostess, " that superstitious people should have made a ghost story out of the curious life and death of the old man and his grandson. But for a man six feet high and well educated as Sam is, I call it absurd."

" Sam believes it ?"

" Sam declares he saw them. The people used to say they two haunted the side of the brook. Sam goes fish- ing for trout sometimes of an evening down the hollow, and he declares he saw them one night, the tall old man and the little boy, moving along in the edge of the bushes and looking and pointing toward the old house. But as to its being ghosts he saw I never believed it, for I al- ways thought the ghosts were Tim Stevens and his boy on their way to steal Alice Brand's chickens. She gen- erally misses some about the time the ghosts are around."

VII.

THE ST. REGIS WATERS IN OLD TIMES.

My first knowledge of the St. Regis waters was in i860. The sun was approaching the forest horizon, but had not yet reached it. All the day we had been asking of the people the distance we had yet to travel, and nev- er was there a country in which the people knew as little about it, or in which opinions so much differed. No two persons agreed in any instance, and we began at length to ask every one we met, old and young, for the mere sake of having a laugh at the new numbers we knew we should get in reply.

Thus at Bloomingdale, we were assured by a man, who said he ought to know, that the distance to Paul Smith's was exactly eleven miles, and then, when we had driven about three miles, we were told by a farmer in the fields that we had yet twelve miles to drive, and a hundred rods farther we met a man who told us it was thirteen ! The next inquiry was of a bright eyed little girl in front of a cottage, who answered that it was nine miles to Paul Smith's; and we drove on patiently across the long swamp, across a barren and desolate sweep of country, and ascending a little hill we re-entered the forest.

It was profoundly still in the deep shades through which we passed. The spirit of silence and repose seemed to have taken possession of the woodland, and

PAUL smith's. 123

the sharp crack of a dry stick under the wheels of our wagon appeared a rude invasion of the domain of quiet.

The horses were pretty well used up. It was then fifty-five miles from Port Kent to Paul Smith's, according to the most approved authorities, and this is a hard day's work for horses not used to the road. They lounged idly down the wood-road through which we were now passing, but soon pricked up their ears as they saw through the trees the gleam of a barn, and then put on the old speed, for a little, to bring us up to the door of Paul Smith's house on Follansbee Pond.

Our welcome was warm and hearty. Paul Smith's name is not Paul, but Apollos A. Smith, and the other name is a way of pronouncing it short. I have used it because he is best known by it. It was then about two years since he first broke the ground on the bank of this lake to build the house he occupies. It was up to that time a wild spot, as it still is. Selecting, with good taste and judgment, a wooded bank where tall pines stretch a hundred feet above the shore, he had hewn away only so many as were in the way of his building, and left the rest standing in primeval grandeur around the house. The scene was therefore one of rare beauty — one to be dreamed of, but seldom to be seen. The pond, which is one of the St. Regis chain or series, is about three miles long, and three quarters of a mile broad. They call it now the Lower St. Regis. The upper end of the pond connects by a narrow river (on nearly the same level) with the Spitfire Pond, and this by a short stream with St. Regis Lake, over which the St. Regis hill stands up, the highest hill among the lakes (for the Adirondack hills are off to the south of us). From the front piazza of Smith's we can see the sides and summit of the St.

124 I GO A- FISHING.

Regis, apparently three or four miles distant. From the summit of the hill you can count more than seventy lakes lying around you. The water-flow is from the St. Regis into the Spitfire, thence into the Follansbee, or Lower St. Regis, and then by the St. Regis River northward to the St. Lawrence.

Having selected this point with so much judgment, Mr. Smith has been careful not to spoil nature by attempt- ing any improvement on the forest and lake. The two are here, and what more do you want for beauty of scen- ery.?

We were somewhat chilled when we reached the door, but the warm welcome was itself sufficient to make us comfortable, and I would not go into the house when that sun was going down in such splendor. So I only ran in to see the more delicate portion of my party taken care of, and then I demanded whether it was possible to take any trout before dark.

Stephen Turner replied to my question. One of the oldest of the forest guides, a warm-hearted old man, whom, if I were going for a week or a month's sojourn into the forest, I would select as the best of company, thoroughly acquainted with his business, and withal a great talker and a fair listener.

From him I learned that brook trout were abundant in one part of the pond, close by the house ; and as the twi- light was at hand, I was resolved to make a few casts that very evening. So we took a boat and pushed off into the blue and crimson splendor which filled the basin of the placid lake. A hundred strokes of the paddle sent the light boat around the end of a rocky point covered with lofty wood, and we coasted the edge of a large tam- arack swamp through which a cold stream of spring wa-

EVENING ON FOLLANSBEE. I25

ter found its way down to the lake. The mouth of the stream was wide, and a dozen rods or so from the shore there were masses of lily pads growing from the mud which the stream brought into the lake. Between the pads and the mouth of the stream we dropped anchor, and I threw my flies over the surface of the clear water.

It was long before we had a rise — so long that I began to doubt the tremendous stories with which my old friend Turner had been amusing me. I changed my flies. I led with a yellow and gold, and followed him with a plain brown ; and then I led with a scarlet ibis, and followed with a hog's wool gray ; and then I changed and changed again, trying large flies and small gnats, hackles and im- itation grubs; and then I gave up casting, and, lying back in the stern of my little boat, watched the splendor of the sky from which the sun had gone a little before.

The day had died most gloriously. The " sword of the sun," that had lain across the forest, was withdrawn and sheathed. There was a stillness on land and water and in the sky that seemed like the presence of an invisible majesty. Eastward, the lofty pine-trees rested their green tops in an atmosphere whose massive blue seemed to sus- tain and support them. Westward, the rosy tints along the horizon deepened into crimson around the base of the St. Regis, and faded into black toward the north.

No sign of life, human or inhuman, was any where visi- ble or audible, except within the little boat where we two floated ; and peace, that peace that reigns where no man is — that peace that never dwells in the abodes of men — here held silent and omnipotent sway.

But a change was coming. The first premonition of it was a sound in the tree-tops, that sighing, soughing of the pines which you have so often heard. At all times and

126 I GO A-FISHING.

places it is a strange and a melancholy sound, but no- where so much so as in the deep forest. It is at first a heavy, distant breath, like the deep respiration, or rather the expiration of many weary men — nay, rather of wom- en, for it is gentle and low. But it rises into the sound of a great grief, the utterance of innumerable sighs ; and now sobs interrupt it, and low wails of single sorrow that have no comparison with other woe, and that will not be appeased by any sympathies. Just such a sound, had you been on the hill-side above Zahleh the night after the Druses made havoc of the Maronites in that city of Leb- anon, you would have heard floating up the heights of the mountain from the doomed city : the sounds of sorrow in a thousand homes ; the mournful cry of the women and children ; and now and then the sob of the dying, gur- gling out with blood. Just such a sound I once heard, or thought I heard, in the night, when I lay awake on the east side of the Rhine, and for an hour on the western side the thunder of cannon ceased, and I could hear the agony of Strasburg, beleaguered by the German hosts, the low moan of her agony ascending above the spire of her holy minster.

But while I listened to the wind in the pine-trees, the gloom had increased, and a ripple came stealing over the water. There was a flapping of one of the lily pads as the first waves struck them ; and then, as the breeze passed over us, I threw two flies on the black ripple. There was a swift rush — a sharp dash and plunge in the water. Both were struck at the instant, and then I had work before me that forbade my listening to the voices of the pines. It took five minutes to kill my fish — two splen- did specimens, weighing each a little less than two pounds. Meantime the rip had increased, and the breeze came

THE LAUGH OF THE LOON. 1 27

fresh and steady. It was too dark now to see the oppo- site shore, and the fish rose at every cast ; and when I had a half dozen of the same sort, and one that lacked only an ounce of being full four pounds, we pulled up the killeck and paddled homeward around the wooded point. The moon rose, and the scene on the lake now became magically beautiful. The mocking laugh of the loon was the only cause of complaint in that evening of splendor. Who can sit in the forest in such a night, when earth and air are full of glory — when the soul of the veriest block- head must be elevated, and when a man begins to feel as if there were some doubt whether he is even a little lower than the angels — who, I say, can sit in such a scene, and hear that fiendish laugh of the loon, and fail to remember Eden and the tempter. Did you ever hear that laugh ? If so, you know what I mean.

That mocking laugh was in my ears as I reeled in my line, and, lying back in the bottom of the canoe, looked up at the still and glorious sky. " Oh, that I could live just here forever," I said, "in this still forest home, by this calm lake, in this undisturbed companionship of earth and sky. Oh that I could leave the life of labor among men, and rest serenely here as my sun goes down the sky."

"Ho! ho! ha I ha!" laughed the loon across the lake, under the great rock of the old Indian.

Well, the loon was right ; and I was, like a great many other men, mistaken in fancying a hermit's life — or, what I rather desired, a life in the country with a few friends — as preferable to life among crowds of men. There is a certain amount of truth, however, in the idea that man made cities, and God made the country.

Doubtless we human creatures were intended to live

125 I GO A- FISHING.

upon the products of the soil, and the animal food which our strength or sagacity would enable us to procure. It was intended that each man should, for himself and those dependent on him, receive from the soil of the earth such sustenance and clothing as he could compel it to yield. But we have invented a system of covering miles square of ground with large flat stones, or piles of brick and mor- tar, so as to forbid the product of any article of nourish- ment, forbidding grass or grain or flower to spring up, since we need the space for our inter-communication with each other, in the ways of traffic and accumulating wealth, while we buy for money, in what we call markets, the food and clothing we should have procured for ourselves from our common mother earth. Doubtless all this is a perversion of the original designs of Providence. The perversion is one that sprang from the accumulation of wealth by a few, to the exclusion of the many, which, in time, resulted in the purchase of the land by the few, and the supply of food in return for articles of luxury manu- factured by artisans who were not cultivators of the soil. But who would listen now to an argument in favor of a re- turn to the nomadic style of life ? I am not going to give you one, and I am not at all inclined to think it advisable for every one ; but in a still, delicious evening like that, I might be pardoned for a sigh when I remembered the workman that I was, and bethought me of the lounger that I might be.

What, man ! Would you join the old cant that "it is great to work ;" that " it is a man's duty to work ;" that " work is prayer ;" that laborare est adorare ? Well, sir, there was a day when I thought so too; but, by my faith, I don't believe a word of it now. I believe I was made to vegetate, to grow and expand, and do something for

HERMIT LIFE. 1 29

Other people, and a great deal for myself and my own ; but not to work any harder than is absolutely consistent with comfort. I don't believe in going to bed early, nor always in rising early — especially in town. I don't be- lieve in hardening my muscles, or making iron out of the flesh God gave me, by gymnastics, or what you call exer- cise. I don't believe in wasting the physique which I have by any extraordinary efforts " for the good of the race." I don't believe in letting alone coffee and tobacco because the doctors are positive that they ought to be and are injurious to the health, or because I believe that they are so myself. The argument of health, which seeks to prolong life by selecting articles of food which are hurtful, and articles which are safe and wholesome, is no argument to me.

But where am I wandering ? The loon was laughing at me when I said to myself that I could be happy in a for- est home. I suppose the loon meant to intimate that I would be tired of it in a few weeks or months ; and per- haps it was so.

As I sat that night on the piazza of Paul Smith's house and looked out on the exceeding beauty of the moonlit lake, and heard again and again that laugh across the water, I began to recall the histories of hermits who had lived and died in forest and wilderness, and then Turner or some one told me the story of Follansbee, after whom the pond was named ; and this, in fact, was a story of hermit life, somewhat exaggerated in the repetitions it has undergone. But when that story was told, and another and another, I sat alone ; and my thoughts went wander- ing over the distant hills to the abodes of the hermits of ancient times, and then I recalled a story of one of them, and told it to my listeners — a story of the old faith.

I

130 I GO A- FISHING.

Laugh at it as we will, deride it as we may, the ages that we call dark were ages of faith in something that may well contrast with this cold, utilitarian age of ours. And when we read or hear the life -histories of the men of those centuries, we learn that men could live and die for a faith, as no man in this age knows how. I say, they were men in those ages. We may well shrink in the comparison of ourselves with them. We may well hide our stories of sacrifice when we read theirs. What if they were ignorant, what if they were superstitious ? What if they did waste treasures untold and lives uncounted in vain battle for a block of wood they called a cross, and an empty cave they called Christ's Sepulchre ? What if all this was folly ? Yet, oh my friend, I beseech you to take a thousand of those men standing before the walls of Jerusalem, with closed helmets, and hands griped firm on sword or battle-axe, while through their lips comes the stern cry of destiny, " God wills it" — Deus vult. I say, compare them with a thousand men of our own city, clamorous around our City Hall for a street to be opened through a grave-yard, an old resting-place of the beloved dead of the last century, or any other barbarianism of the age in which you and I live. Do this, and then tell me, if you dare, that the men of the Middle Ages w^ere less noble than we. A thousand years hence, when the world shall have advanced to another standing- place whence to look back on these centuries, the men of the world will think this nineteenth century blacker than night, com- pared with their notions of what constitutes light ; and yet, measured by standards in the hands of the immor- tals, it may be that we shall be found as light as they, and the ages gone by will not be so profoundly gloomy. I was going to tell that story of the old time, but on re-

THE ECHO. 131

flection this is neither the time nor place for it ; and so, though I did remember and relate it, sitting on the piazza in the moonlight, I will spare you the recital.

There is an echo across the lake which is more beauti- ful in its effect than any thing I remember to have heard. The distance is nearly a mile. The shore opposite is densely wooded. This forest returns as perfect waves of sound as if it were a wall of rock. The distance over and back requires about ten seconds, and hence a long bugle note, or a succession of notes on the horn, such as the opening bar of " Anacreon in Heaven," or " The Star- Spangled Banner," may be given on the piazza, and a few seconds of silence follow, and then out of the distant forest, across the lake, the notes come back with a sweet- ness that can not be imagined.

Long before this I ought to have been in bed. I had ridden fifty miles, and then caught trout till after dark ; and yet I sat till midnight on the piazza, and felt no sen- sation of fatigue as yet. The return to the forest was like wine to me.

One who has in former years lived much in the woods, forms a stronger attachment for that life than a man ever forms for any other. The affection which we have for the companions of our solitude is very strong. It is the same principle on which prisoners have loved toads and spiders, or even inanimate objects. Hence, when I find myself in the woods, the old sights and sounds come back with such force that I can not tear myself away. Even after the other occupants of the house had gone to their beds and were sound asleep in their several places, 1 walked down to the beach, and, pushing off one of the canoe-like boats, paddled away into the moonlight on the water, and then lay still, listening to the old familiar

132 I GO A-FISHING.

sounds — the wind, the short yelp of a dreaming hound in some camp, the rush of a hungry trout seeking his food in the night-time, and constantly that laugh of the loon, varied now and then by his long, mournful cry.

Late as it was when I slept, I awoke with daybreak, and paddling one of the canoe-like boats around to the bay where I had taken the trout the evening before, threw my fly and took a couple of splendid specimens of the Follansbee inhabitants. I wanted no more, and took no more, but again lay in the bottom of the boat and watched the changes of the moving sky.

While I was thus lying, waiting for whatever sounds of the forest and sky T might hear, two large herons came wheeling downward around me, and lit on the drift-wood at the edge of the tamarack swamp through which the Weller brook comes down to the lake. Stalking along from log to log, or plunging their long legs in the oozy swamp, they paid no attention to my presence, but occu- pied themselves with their own fishing arrangements, as if the wilderness were their own.

A plunge in the swamp startled them, and they raised their long necks and looked into the recesses which my eye could not penetrate. Another plunge, and they qui- etly resumed their fishing, while I looked the more ea- gerly; for if the birds were undisturbed by such a noise, I knew that the maker of it must be one of the forest in- habitants from whom they had nothing to fear. Nor was I wrong, for in a minute or so I saw a bush snake, and another, and another, then a buck made his appearance, quietly sauntering along, as fearless of harm as the her- ons. I was as motionless as breathing would allow ; he did not see me till he was at the edge of the lake. Then indeed he caught sight of me, and pausing like a statue

DEER-SHOOTING.

133

one instant, he sprang into the air and was away, dash- ing, plunging, hurry-scurry through the swamp as far as I could hear him.

The Adirondack woods abound in deer. It is an easy matter to kill a half-dozen in a day, and they frequently do it at a place like Smith's. But I am compelled to say that some of the Adirondack hunters would not be admitted into the society of hunters of which my an- cient friend and ally Black, of Owl Creek cabin, was the leader, and for this reason : they butcher the deer here instead of shooting them in a fair way. Some still-hunt- ing is done, but the principal part of the hunting here consists in driving the deer into the lakes, and drowning them in the most abominable manner. I can see your flush of indignation, my old friend, when you read this ac- count of the way they treat our game in the forests of Northern New York, and so thoroughly was I disgusted with it that I declined taking any share in any of the hunts. I could see it done, sitting on the piazza of Smith's house ; and this was the way of it.

The dogs were sent out with one of the hunters, who crossed the lake and went over to the Upper St. Regis Lake, putting the dogs out on the side toward the Fol- lansbee. Here they soon found the scent and opened on it, and the music came to us across three miles of inter- vening forest. As soon as they opened, the hunters at Smith's, three sportsmen, each with a guide, got into their boats and paddled off on the Follansbee Pond, taking po- sitions close under the shores on three sides.

An hour passed, during which the dogs were heard at intervals ; then suddenly one of the guides caught sight of a black spot on the surface of the pond, moving not unlike a loon. It required a sharp eye to see it in the

134 I GO A-FISHING.

rip that covered the surface, and no one but a hunter would have known that it was a deer, swimming with the tip of his nose and half his head out of water — or her nose and her head, for in this case it proved to be a doe.

The sportsman in the boat with the guide who had first seen the game had, as it turned out, a rifle that would not go off, and, after vain snapping, the guide paddled swiftly up and overtook the frightened doe, who, as soon as she saw her pursuer, had turned for the shore she had left.

The sportsman intercepted her flight, and then pro- ceeded to belabor the poor animal's head with a paddle, and force her under water. The battle was by no means well fought on his side, and the guide was obliged con- stantly to use his paddle in the water and "surround" the poor frightened doe, who was steadily nearing the shore notwithstanding all his efforts.

But now the other two boats came up and joined the fray, and the murder was accomplished more artistically. One guide dashed in adroitly and seized the body of the doe so as to throw her up in the water, and enable him to catch her by the tail. This was necessary to prevent her sinking when the other should dispatch her ; for at certain seasons, and in certain conditions of the venison, the deer will not float in water, but goes down like a stone.

This point secured, he held her by the tail, and then it was easy for his sportsman to blow her brains out with his rifle.

This, on my word, is the manner in which nine deer out of ten that are killed in the Adirondacks are mur- dered ; unless, perhaps, I should except from the count those that are drowned with the birch withes. For it is

A BUCK. 135

very common to save the gunpowder by catching the deer over the head or horns with a long birch sapling withed in a noose at the end, and then press the head under water until absolute drowning is effected. The blood is then let out by a quick cut across the throat.

Contrast this with our way of hunting in old times, on the banks of Owl Creek, or on the Delaware and the Sus- quehanna.

How well I remember a breezy morning when the music of the hounds came down the valley of the Delaware, from the hills above the great rapids of the Callicoon. I stood at the run on the west side of the river, a mile above Kellum's, and the deer, after a long run, came down di- rectly before me, on the opposite shore. But he saw me before he took the plunge, and wheeling about went up the precipitous bank, whither my bullet — sent at a long venture — in vain followed him.

I leaped into the canoe that was lying under the bushes near me, for I knew that the buck was heading down to a lower run, and I went flying down the rapids, swift as the deer was going through the woods behind the hills. We almost met at the lower run ; for I had but leaped from my canoe when he came out of the bushy bank and took the water at a flying leap. The foam dashed high as he pressed across the shallows, and then I shouted after him ; and as he leaped into the air, the ball intended for his fore-shoulder broke the hind-leg below the joint.

He turned and charged up the shore, first looking as if he would have annihilated me, and thinking better of that took the land a hundred yards below, and, stumbling up the bank, fell as my second ball from old swivel-breech went to the intended spot.

You will perhaps say my way of killing him was no

136 I GO A -FISHING.

less murder than the Adirondack drowning. But I think otherwise, and so will any one who believes in giving game a chance for life.

A few words by way of practical advice to Adirondack visitors may be of value here, notwithstanding the many books in which more full information can be found. Paul Smith's is a good hotel, for families as well as sportsmen. Ladies can enjoy a stay there, and can go a-fishing when they please.

The boats are constructed for the lake country. They are built of very thin stuff, and are so light that one man easily takes one on his back and walks off, up hill and down, for a half or three quarters of a mile without fatigue. Each boat will hold two persons comfortably, and three, or even four, if necessary.

Having entered the forest at Paul Smith's, you will per- haps desire to pursue the usual plan of some Adirondack visitors and camp out in the woods for a while. The mo- dus operandi is this :

Your party will require guides and boats according to their number and character. Ladies, who will find it cap- ital fun to try forest life, need more guides than gentle- men ; and in fact, here as elsewhere, the only direction for traveling with ladies is to provide them with abundant physical strength in the way of guides and assistants. A lady can travel in any part of the known world with her husband or brother, if the latter will only take care that she has ample attendance, easy horses or methods of car- riage, and is never under any circmnstances for one instant allowed to over-fatigue herself

Thus, if you have ladies, make your day's journeys shorter by half Make long detours by water, if thereby you can avoid fatiguing tramps through the forest. But

GOING INTO CAMP. I37

let the ladies be assured they can hunt and fish in the Adirondacks quite as well as gentlemen ; and if they will, they can shoot deer as often as their husbands (the guide holding the animal as aforesaid).

At Smith's, you will select your guides and purchase outfit and provisions. Smith has every requisite and lux- ury on hand. The guides are in general a fine set of good-hearted, simple-minded, noble fellows; excellent company in the forest, well acquainted with its sights and sounds, its language, that to you may be unintelligible, but to them is like English to an Englishman, they can translate to you a thousand written tales on wood and water, on hill and rock. Not unsusceptible to poetry, they will appreciate the beauty of that language, even more keenly than you, until you learn their simplicity of thought. "Learn simplicity," said I.'* well, it may per- haps be acquired.

VIII.

THE ST. REGIS WATERS NOW.

My latest visit to the St. Regis waters was in the spring of 1872. It was early in May, the fifth or the sixth, when Dupont and I drove up to the door at Paul Smith's, now a large hotel capable of accommodating a hundred and fifty guests. Thus early in the season there were no sportsmen in the house, and we had it all at our service. It was so pleasant that, with the exception of a week in town, given to business, I remained there until the first of July. Reasons touching the state of my health made it desirable for me to spend all the days, rainy or sunny, in the open air, and I took more or less fish every day, ex- cepting Sundays.

We had passed the night at Franklin Falls, and reached Smith's a little before noon. We had no unpacking to do, for our baggage was slender. I looked out of my bed- room window at Peter's Rock across the lake, and won- dered whether trout would still rise to a fly over there as in other years. Descending to the front piazza with our Norris rods in hand, we found a small assembly of guides waiting to greet us. When they saw the fly rods they opened their eyes and mouths.

^ You don't think of fly-fishing at this season, do you .?"

"Why not?"

" Why, the trout never rise to a fly here till the first of June."

JOHN AND FRANK. I39

" Nonsense ; you don't know any thing about it."

Unruffled by the short reply, which certainly seemed sufficiently impertinent from a couple of city sportsmen to a group of Adirondack guides, John M'Laughlin ap- pealed earnestly to Frank Hobart, saying, " Now, Frank, what do you say, will trout rise to a fly in the St. Regis waters before the last of May ?"

" No, they won't," was Frank's categorical answer.

"Do they ever rise nowadays at Peter's Rock?" I asked.

" Yes, in the season, plenty of them."

" Then just get your boats on the water, and we'll show you whether they will rise as early as this."

In ten minutes or less we were standing on the rock, and at the second or third cast a half-pound fish came up and took the bobber with a rush, as if he wanted it. I had scarcely struck him when Dupont had a larger one on his tail fly. John looked at Frank and said nothing. Another and another rose and were landed, but as yet no large fish. At length, casting along the edge of the rock, I struck a full-pound trout, and he was one of the strongest fish of his size that I have ever seen. When he was landed, John quietly remarked :

" Well, Frank, I'm beat, and I give it up — don't you ?"

"Yes, I give it up," said Frank quietly, and walked down the rock to hand Dupont his landing-net for another full-pound fish.

" Now, I'll tell you," said John, in a reflecting, thought- ful tone, " I'll tell you what it is. We have a way of do- ing things always in the same way, and we begin every spring with trolling for lake trout, and we think there's no use fly-fishing till the trolling season is well over ; and the fact is, nobody ever thought of throwing a fly here as

140 I GO A- FISHING.

early as this, and consequently we've been thinking al- ways that trout wouldn't rise to a fly till June. Live and learn !"

John, however, was right to this extent, that until the trout get to feeding on flies they do not rise so freely as later in the season, and large fish seldom rise in the early spring; and they do not congregate at the mouths of brooks, but seem to be scattered and more diflicult to find in large lakes until the water grows warmer. In a week's fishing, among several hundred trout that we took, none were very much over a pound in weight, and the • major portion were smaller fish. We threw back many quarter-pound fish, reserving only a few of the small ones, because I esteem them for table use as vastly better than larger ones.

We whiled away the afternoon on the rock and on Isl- and Point across the lake near the house. In the bay, off the mouth of the swamp brook, where in August in old times I have killed many a three-pounder, I could not get a rise. The trout approach the cold brooks later in the season, when the lake water begins to get warm. I note this fact, that nearly every trout which I took on this aft- ernoon rose to a bright green fly unlike any American in- sect that I know of, and which I used because it happened to be on an old leader that had never been dismanded since I killed trout with it on Loch Katrine. There were no flies on the water, and it was so cold that night that the ice froze like a pane of glass over small ponds.

We sat by the fire in the evening, and I told Dupont stories of the old times in those regions, which seem to have passed out of the memory of the present generation.

And then we talked of far lands where we two had wandered together — for it was only a little more than

OSGOOD RAPIDS. I4I

two years since Dupont and I had heard the roar of the Nile bursting through the barriers of Syene; and then we grew sleepy, though it was not yet midnight, and then we went to our rooms and slept. But once before I slept I heard that mocking laugh of the loon, and then the wind rose among the pine-trees by the house, and I fell asleep listening to the strange sound, full of memories.

Monday morning was bright and clear — too clear for fly-fishing; but we held an early consultation, and John and Frank agreed that, since trout would rise to a fly ear- ly in May, notwithstanding local traditions to the contra- ry, there was no place in which they were more likely to be found than the Osgood Rapids. So we went to the Osgood Rapids. As a general rule, all the streams in the Adirondack region are sluggish for long distances, and fall over short, rocky rapids here and there. The whole country is a level, with innumerable lakes and ponds connecting with one another by these streams. The Osgood, a small lake, three fourths of a mile from Smith's house, receives the water from Jones Pond, and discharges a stream, tolerably strong in high water, into Meacham Lake, some miles distant.

Boats for fishing the Osgood must be carried from Smith's, and to one who has not seen it the procession of a party crossing " a carry " is very droll. The guides lift the boats, upside down, on their backs, supported by a yoke which fits the shoulders, and walk off as comfortably as a man with a carpet-bag. You can see the boats, but only the legs of the guides. They seem to be boats walk- ing— a row of elongated terrapins; and when two or three move off in a line the scene is odd and amusing. It is no small work to carry a boat three quarters of a mile, and many of the carries in this country are much longer.

142 I GO A-FISHING.

We made a few casts on the lake, and Dupont took a couple of fish — one a full pound, and the other three quarters — from underneath an old log near the shore. Then we crossed the lake, and went down the river two miles or so, lifting the boats over one ruined bridge, and pausing here and there at the mouths of cold brooks to try if the trout would rise. But we did not find any till we reached the head of the rapids, where we went ashore, put on our wading-trousers, and, standing at the top of the rocky fall, cast over the swift water. Now here was an interesting fact, which I beg you, who are concerned to know the habits of trout, to consider. The rapids were about three hundred feet in length. The water was deep at top and foot. But no trout were to be found above or below the swift water. It was only in the rushing current that they were lying, and here they were innumerable. Casting over the swift water, and drawing the flies rapid- ly up against or across it, would bring up the fish in plenty. There were few large fish. None that we got that day went over a pound, and not many over a half. It made little difference what flies we used. They rose to any thing, and struck sharply. In an hour or two we had killed some fifty or sixty fish, and the sun was now overhead, hot and glaring, and we were getting only small trout. So we stopped our work and went down stream to investigate other places in the deep shadows of the pine groves.

You never saw a stream more thoroughly fit for trout than this was, full of deep, dark holes under rocks and brush; but there were no trout in it below the rapid. We passed some hours in the vain search for them, and at length came back to the head of the rapids and threw ourselves down on the bank, weary and exhausted with

OSGOOD RAPIDS. I43

some miles of wading and struggling through swamps and underbrush.

The sun had gone westward, and the shadows of the pines were thrown across the stream. Wild pigeons were abundant in the trees. Now and then a flight of duck went over us. The wind was gentle, but it roared in the pine-trees as if a heavy surf were breaking just beyond the hill. We took our places again on the rapid, Dupont on one rock in mid-stream, with Frank by his side, myself on another rock witji John. It would seem that the num- ber of fish had been increased, instead of diminished, by our morning's work. They rose at every cast, and we landed them at our ease. We threw back countless small fish which we did not care to take out, and finished the day's sport with a hundred and fifteen trout to take home for the supply of the hotel. It is a comfort to take fish where they are sure to be useful for food, and it is a sub- ject of profound regret that many persons go into the woods and camp, and, having only a few mouths to sup- ply, kill large numbers of trout which are not eaten, but thrown away. No sportsman does this. It is only the inexperienced and thoughtless who find pleasure in kill- ing fish for the mere sake of killing them. I have often amused myself, after taking all the fish that I needed for food, by breaking off the point of a fly-hook and casting the harmless deception to call up the trout, and watch their swift rush and splendid plunges. But there is no sport in killing fish unless some one will eat them.

We gathered our traps together — the rods, the wading- trousers and shoes, the landing-nets and the fish — and started homeward. Up the river, rowing easily till we lifted over the old bridge, then up the narrow, winding stream, with the guide kneeling in the bow of the boat,

144 I GO A- FISHING.

and poling her against the current with the oar, or drag- ging by the bushes, which almost met overhead. Out again into the broader river, and then into the open lake — calm and still, a perfect mirror — and across it to the foot of the carry, and then over the hills through the for- est to our home.

Whatsoever else has changed, the old echo of years ago is the same at this spot. It seems to me sometimes as if it were from another world that these responses come in the darkness — so long is the interval, and so pure and soft the answer even to a harsh and heavy call. But, alas ! there are no answers audible to the waking ears out of the earthly distances toward which we send our most longing calls.

I returned, as I have said, to the city, and Dupont aban- doned me. I went back to the St. Regis a week later with an artist friend, the best living painter of fish, and he remained a few days, and then I had the month of June to myself alone. The weather came on suddenly hot. It was welcome, for the trout which in the early spring had been scattered about the lakes, loving cool water, began to gather around the mouths of the cold brooks, and we found them more easily. A leaf from my memoranda will give an idea of how the time for one week was employed.

Mofiday, June \oth. — John M'Laughlin and Frank Hobart guides ; morning on the Lower St. Regis, in sight of the house all the time ; a dozen fish, two or three a pound each ; after luncheon to Barnum Lake ; carry three fourths of a mile to Osgood ; cross the upper end of Os- good, and carry again a mile to Barnum; no fish till just at dusk, when I got half a dozen, one only going over a pound and a half

OSGOOD RIVER. 1 45

Tuesday, nth. — Osgood Rapids; plenty of small fish, but none large; gave up fishing, and lounged on the rocks all day.

Wednesday, 12th. — Morning on Lower St. Regis; a half-dozen good fish; afternoon on Barnum; a gale of wind blowing and a heavy sea; six fish, one a pound and three quarters.

Thursday, i7,t/i. — Explored Deer Pond; went down the St. Regis outlet to the mill, and carried in a half mile to the pond; heavy rain pouring all day; a dozen good trout ; home to dinner at six. After dinner tried the old place a hundred rods from Smith's house at the mouth of Weller brook; took six fish about a pound each.

Friday, 14th. — Osgood all day long; about forty good fish and many smaller.

Saturday, i^th. — Drove down the wood road toward Meacham seven miles; left the horse standing and w^ent into Osgood River, fishing it, wading, about two miles; ninety fine fish, all good size, many over a pound; driv- ing home, as we crossed the inlet of Barnum, waded into the shoal water and cast over the lily pads, taking three pound fish.

That last day of the week is worthy somewhat extend- ed notice, since thereby I may give to the inexperienced reader some instruction in river-fishing. The Osgood River, coming out of Osgood Pond, runs some three miles through swamps a heavy, sluggish flow, receiving occa- sionally the water of a cold brook. Then it plunges down a short rocky rapid, of which I have before spoken in this volume, flows swiftly around rocks and through dense green woods for a mile or so, then pursues a wind- ing course, now slow and deep, now swdft over gravelly

K

146 I GO A -FISHING.

bottom, for three or four miles, until it emerges from the forest and runs through the Burnt Ground. This is a large tract of sandy and rolling country from which all forest has disappeared, probably because of a fire. The river, in a deep ravine, is bordered by thick brush, and for two miles winds in a swift current between hilly sides, so that the angler who commences to whip the stream near Mountain Pond can come out after four or five hours' work within a mile of his starting-point.

I drove over from Smith's with John and Frank, and, leaving the wagon at a convenient point, went into the river in the morning, not far below Mountain Pond.

Although there is vastly more pleasure to the experi- enced angler in using a seven-ounce rod, I recommend for work in such a river, among underbrush whose branches and roots often extend into the water, a somewhat heav- ier weapon. I used a rod made of ash, weighing nine or ten ounces, which I call a black-bass rod. It served its purpose well when heavy fish went under the masses of overhanging alder, or dived into bunches of roots, from which only patience and a steady pressure could extract them.

John took a stout bait-rod and deceived the trout with the tail of a red-fin on a strong hook. I used two flies, on the tail a dark brown, almost black fly, and above a Montreal claret and gray.

I said I went into the river. I mean what I say. In the early season I am accustomed to wear English wad- ing-stockings, with heavy brogans over them. When the warm weather advances I eschew all rubber coverings. The objection to India-rubber clothing is chiefly that it confines the ordinary insensible perspiration and makes it decidedly sensible. In cool weather it is less unpleas-

DOWN THE RIVER. I47

ant, but in warm weather I find it intolerable, and wade without attempting to keep dry.

For a mile or so I think the fly took two trout to one for the bait. They rose mostly to the brown tail fly. But we got no large fish. The river was deep and strong. Heavy rains had swollen it, and an occasional plunge into a deep hole warned me to be cautious if I did not care to swim.

At length we approached a spot where the river nar- rowed, and ran swift and strong under a log which crossed it three feet above the surface. On either side the bank was cut under by the current.

" I wonder," said John, " whether my big fish is in his hole under that bank."

" Do you keep one there ?"

" I left one there last year. I lifted him out twice and lost him."

" Try him again now, and I'll look on."

So John let his red-fin tail swing down the current, and, drawing it toward the bank, dragged it swiftly up under the crossing log. The trout lay in his hole and saw it, and made a bold dash at it.

" I've got him," said John, as he swung him out, but down he went again into the swift current.

" He's gone back to the same hole," said John, and repeated the manoeuvre. The result was precisely the same, and again he lifted him out, dragged him ten feet in the rushing rapid, and lost him. " I'll have him yet," said the determined guide ; and at him he went again, and again hooked and lost him.

Mark the fact that this trout had been severely hooked three times, and as many times repeated his rush at the bait; for on the fourth attempt John landed him, a pound-

148 I GO A-FISHING.

and-a-quarter fish, with his mouth badly torn by the pre- vious failures.

Whether fish suffer pain from wounds is a question much discussed among anglers. I am convinced that they do not. My opinion is based on many facts like this which I have related. I once lost two hooks in suc- cession, fishing with bait in a deep hole, under closely hanging bushes, where I could not use a fly. Finding that my snells were not to be trusted, I knotted a hook on the line, tried the third time, and landed a fine trout from whose mouth I took the two hooks which I had lost. I once took a small trout on a fly, who rose sharp- ly and struck with vigor, whose side had within a few hours been so badly torn by another fish, or by a hook, that the skin was gone from the belly to the dorsal fin a full inch wide, leaving the red flesh exposed. I have seen a skate, weighing more than fifty pounds,, caught on a bait-hook in Fisher's Island Sound, drawn up to the side of the boat and his throat cut across with a gash in- tended to be and supposed to be sufficiently deep to kill him. The same skate was caught and brought out on the same hook within thirty minutes afterward. In- stances might be multiplied from my own experience. Other anglers could furnish many more. From such ob- servations I have become convinced that wounds do not give to fish that sensation which we call pain.

The angler who has hooked a fish with bait and lost him, should not hesitate to throw again into the same spot ; for, unless the fish has been frightened by seeing the fisherman, he will take the bait as readily the second time, and often with more vigor, as if angry at its hav- ing escaped him. This is especially true of pike and pickerel. I once took a pike in Glen Falloch, at the

EIGHT FROM ONE HOLE. I49

head of Loch Lomond, who struck a spoon four times before I landed him, and each time was badly torn by the hooks.

But, on the other hand, it is generally true that if a trout is pricked by a fly-hook he will not rise to it again. This is, perhaps, owing to the simple fact that he has found no taste of flesh on the hook. In one single instance in my experience I have known an exception to this rule. Casting on a lake in the Franconia Mountains, I pricked a two-pound trout, and pricked him badly. The water was clear, and I saw him rush off, turn, and, as my fly again fell in the same spot, go at it with a fierce dart, and I landed him. I speak, of course, of trout as I have known them. In all that I say of trout-fishing, I beg my reader to bear in mind, what I have elsewhere tried to make plain, that the habits of trout vary with their local habita- tions, and there are many waters full of them of which I know nothing, and where their customs may be quite dif- ferent from those which I have learned.

When John had landed his old friend, I went down to the log and threw my flies below it. There was a project- ing point of the bank some thirty feet down stream, under which the body of the current was flowing. As the tail fly came up, and swung across this current within a foot of the bank, I had a fine strike, and drew out into the open river a good pound trout. He made fierce strug- gles, but I killed him in two minutes, and struck another at the same spot. In fifteen minutes I had taken eight trout from that hole, averaging a pound each, every one striking the fly at the same point to an inch, and then I could not raise another fin.

" Try your bait there, John."

Down went the red-fin tail on the current, and into the

150 I GO A-FISHING.

hole. No trout moved while it went down ; but the in- stant it was drawn up the water boiled as a good fish struck it, and then John took three more, making twelve that we had from that one hole, and all good fish.

A little farther down the river, in the afternoon, as I was slowly going down the middle of the stream, casting some thirty feet of line before me, I saw a sudden com- motion a hundred feet ahead, and three or four small fish, red-fins or shiners, springing into the air. This on river or lake is very fair evidence that a large trout is chasing them. I plunged rapidly forward ; and, as the brush for- tunately opened just here so as to give me a longer back cast, I rapidly increased my length of line until, at sixty or seventy feet distance, my tail fly fell exactly where the shiners had gone out of water. I was by no means sure that a trout who was feeding on fish would rise to a fly ; but this fellow was making a large dinner, and mixed his dishes. The second or third cast brought him up. What a magnificent roll and plunge that was, as he turned his peach-and-gold side up to my satisfied vision. Satisfied, because at the same instant I felt his heavy stroke on the Montreal fly, and knew by the short, sharp click which I felt, but can not describe, that he was firmly hooked. He seemed to know it also, for he went down stream at a tearing rate. The sound of the reel was whizzing instead of whirring. I had but fifty yards of line on my reel, and this fellow had taken forty, and I was floundering down among rocks and rapids after him, when he turned and came up stream. I never use a multiplying reel for trout. The occasion does not happen once a year with me when I desire one, and the rapidity with which it takes in line has, by reason of knots and snarls, cost me so many broken tips that I have long abandoned its use, ex-

A GAME FISH. 151

cept for Striped bass. Possibly, had I been able to re- cover line as fast as this fish came up stream, 1 should have saved him. As it was, by the time I had reeled in thirty yards I found my flies free for another cast, and I cast again. It is of no use to lament a lost fish. I had enjoyed the satisfaction of his first strike. Though an angler often says after landing a fine fish, " I was sure of him when I felt him strike," nevertheless, I suppose he never yet felt really sure of a fish until he had him in the landing-net — nor then always. More than once I have seen a fine fish not yet dead thrown overboard from the bottom of a boat, where his teeth were caught in the meshes of the landing-net suddenly lifted to take in an- other. It is safe to be always ready to lose a fish. Nor have I ever known a more remarkable loss than occurred to me still later on that day. Frank had followed down the bank of the river, and I had twice given him my full basket to empty. After the second emptying, the first fish which I took I put in it, a three-quarter pounder, and, standing on a fallen tree six feet above the stream, cast below over a deep hole, and, as I cast, saw this fish's head coming out of the receiving hole in the top of the basket. Before my left hand could reach him, a flap of his tail sent him like a shot into the air before my eyes, and he vanished in the pool below me.

"John," said I, "after that I am going home. A soli- tary fish standing up on his tail and putting his head out of the hole in a twelve-pound creel is a wonderful sight, and means something. Let us be superstitious for once, and stop work."

I have thus given a sketch of six days of Adirondack fishing, and you perceive a gradual improvement in the catch offish as the season advanced. At the same time,

152 I GO A-FISHING.

however, you will bear in mind that black flies and mos- quitoes increase as the fishing improves.

On Monday morning before breakfast I killed nine fish near the house, at the mouth of the Weller brook, which weighed eleven and a half pounds. I can not learn from any one that a speckled trout has been taken in these Adirondack waters for many years weighing over four pounds. There is nothing in size to equal our Maine waters, where the brook trout grows to weigh eleven pounds, and where seven and eight pound fish are as common as three-pound fish elsewhere. It is not a very common thing in the Adirondacks in modern times to find a trout over two and a half pounds. I saw one taken out of Cold Brook, a branch of the Osgood, which was a little short of three pounds. But it will prove difficult to find a comfortable hotel and home like Paul Smith's any where in the world with plenty of good trout within ten minutes of the door, and in the later season a reasonable number of three-pounders. My camping days are pretty much over, and I prefer now a good roof, a good table, a good bed, and some of the refinements of civilized life in the evening after a day's sport, and here one has all that is needed.

My camping days are pretty much over, I say, and yet I slept on the balsam boughs one night. John and Frank were very anxious to have me revive old memories by going to Follansbee Junior for a night. I yielded to the temptation, and on Wednesday morning, while Frank went in on foot across the woods, John and myself went down the St. Regis River fishing, till we came to the junction of the Follansbee outlet, and up that to the pond. The St. Re- gis is a wild stream, now pouring down rocky rapids, now gliding swiftly under dark pine groves, now lounging slug-

FOLLANSBEE JUNIOR. 1 53

gishly in the sunshine between banks loaded with the swamp alders. The water was low, and we could not shoot all the rapids, so that we had now and then to jump out in the stream and lower the boat among the rocks. A half-dozen times we lifted her over fallen trees. In one place we slipped through under a fallen pine by lying flat in the bottom, and had not an inch to spare, as the bark of the old tree scraped our backs. There are some points of rare beauty along the river, and all the way the scenery is wild and fine.

But the outlet of Follansbee Junior was fearful for boat work. At best it is but a brook, winding in a thousand short curves and angles for a mile and a half from the pond to the St. Regis. We found it unusually low, and some one had broken up the beaver dams, of which there were three or four on it, and which served to set back the water somewhat and make it deeper. We had as hot and heavy an afternoon's work as could be desired. Now we pushed with our paddles, now we dragged on the bushes, now we stuck fast in sharp angles, and now we found the water almost wholly invisible ahead of us among the roots of the alders. I became so thoroughly disgusted with the work that, having the bow paddle, I jumped over, and, seizing her by the nose, plunged ahead and dragged her for a quarter of a mile. But this was none too easy, for the treacherous little brook abounds in holes into which I went deep, and in quicksand bottom where my feet sank and stuck hard. But perseverance conquers, and we came out of the woods at last on the calm surface of the beauti- ful little lake, and paddled up to the old shanty where Frank was waiting for us. Many who read this, and more who will not read it, remember that old shanty on Follans- bee Junior which has been for many a year the sports-

154 I GO A -FISHING.

man's favorite camp. Built in a swamp, with intent to have it where it will not be burned by forest fires, it is the chosen resort of many million mosquitoes and black flies, and yet it has been the resting-place of a hundred sports- men in past times. For the lake abounds in trout, and is a choice feeding-place for deer. In the evening we paddled up to the mouth of the principal inlet brook and took out some trout for supper; for those which I had taken in the day I had sent home by a boy who came in with Frank. The twilight was fading into a soft moon- light, and I lay back in the boat, on the lonesome lake, and remembered scenes in old days that will not come back, call them ever so loud, ever so beseechingly.

Once I was on this lake, with John M'Laughlin for my guide as now, and when the evening came down it began to rain, and the fish rose fast. It was the deer season then, but we were after trout. I was seated on the bow of the boat, John at the stern holding her fast by his paddle driven into the sandy bottom. A rifle lay in the boat at his feet, but we had not thought of using it. I had on a white rubber coat — one of the light English coats, almost as white as linen, and a broad-brim white felt hat, turned down all around to shed the rain. As I was casting I raised my eyes to the opposite shore of the pond, a hundred rods across, and saw a buck come out of the cover to the shore. I spoke in a low voice —

"John, there's a deer."

"Where?"

"Just to the right of the Quebec landing."

" I see him. I'll try how near I can paddle you up to him, if you'll shoot."

" No, I'll sit still if you'll paddle and shoot, but with this

SHOOTING A BUCK. 1 55

white coat of mine I don't believe we can stir without his going."

I used to think that a deer was one of the most foolish of animals, for he will even stand and look steadily at a man as long as the man is motionless, but almost at the wink of an eye, surely at the slightest movement of a head or hand, he is away. Imagine the scene as we moved across the lake in the gloaming, for it was past sunset of a rainy evening, and tell me if that buck was not exceed- ingly stupid for an animal supposed to be timid beyond all others. I was in the extreme bow, a white statue. I folded my arms cautiously at the start to cover even my hands. John and the boat were out of sight behind me, and the paddle was invisible and noiseless as we shot across the lake. He was feeding on the grass in the edge of the water, standing broadside to us with his head down. At fifty rods' distance he raised his head and saw us. Stretching up his long neck and turning his head full at us, he stared in astonishment at first, curiosity next, satis- faction at last, for the paddle had stopped, and he only looked at a motionless white mass which resembled noth- ing he ever saw before. As soon as he began to feed again we advanced swiftly some fifteen or twenty rods, when he lifted his head again, and again seemed lost in wonderment. We were not more than thirty rods off, and as he looked at me I looked at him for full two min- utes, but though I could see his eyes he clearly failed to see mine. If he had ever been in the Vatican Gallery he would have recognized the queer object before him. It resembled nothing so much as a herculean torso, without arms, of old marble a little yellowed by earth and age. Certainly he had never before seen a man in a white rub- ber coat, for at length he went to feeding again. Now

156 I GO A- FISHING.

John sent his paddle into the water. Ten or a dozen sharp strokes, and up went the head again to look at us, but the bow of the boat swerved just enough to let John shoot over my left, and at the instant the rifle cracked, down went the buck, dead at the fall. I never saw a deer fall more suddenly. After that I advised sportsmen to paddle up to deer with white rubber coats on.

IX.

CONNECTICUT STREAMS.

All along the northern shore of Long Island Sound, running down through the rocky "back-bone" of Connec- ticut, which is generally only three or four miles distant from the Sound, are streams of water which used to abound in trout. Perhaps they do so still, but it is some years since I have fished them. I know that some of these streams are now preserved, and yield abundant recompense to their guardians.

The salt-water trout, as some call them, differ in no re- spect from the mountain trout. And whether their flavor is improved by access to the salt water is a matter of taste. The rich red color of their meat is probably due to the abundance of shrimp and shell-fish on which they feed. And this is also the most probable reason for the variation in the color of the meat of inland trout. Most of our lakes and slow running streams abound in fresh- water shrimp, which are a favorite food of trout. They are small, but can be found by thousands in masses of weed and water plants, and where they are thus seen the trout will invariably be found to have red meat. In swift running streams the shrimp are not found, and the meat of the trout is white. Probably other food of a similar character, possibly snails and small shell-fish, con- tribute to the ruddy tint of the flesh. As a general rule,

158 I GO A-FISHING.

the trout with red meat is esteemed superior in flavor. But this is not an invariable rule. My own taste places as generally the finest flavored trout I know of those which are taken in Profile Lake in New Hampshire, and which have red meat, but I have often found them fully equaled by the small trout from the Pemigewasset River, which runs out of the lake, and whose flesh is always white. These trout are, however, better in flavor in rainy seasons, when the river is high, and inferior when the streams run low. The flavor of trout of the Connecticut shore coming up from the salt water is uniformly fine, and I think as a. general rule superior to the Long Isl- and trout. The latter are sometimes woody even after a run in the bay. In fact, the flavor depends chiefly on the food, and somewhat on the freedom of exercise which the fish enjoys.

There was a stream not far from New London which in former years I was accustomed to fish with great suc- cess. It ran through a variety of country, rising far back among the hills and wandering, now in a deep swampy forest, now losing itself in a difluse course over acres of marsh, and now dashing down a rocky hill, into a field of hard turf, through which it flows under high, bare banks, and now again descending a ravine, from rock to rock, and basin to basin, till it reaches the pool at the bottom of the hill, which is also the head of tide-water, in an arm of the sea that puts up thus far. I might add, that it is crossed by a railroad bridge before it reaches the salt water, from which many thousand eyes have looked down on the stream, without knowing what treasures to the fisherman lay below its surface.

In point of fact, it was in that way that I discovered the stream. I had crossed it two or three times, and each

PLUNGING IN. 159

time when in haste ; but each time with the resolution formed that I would one day sound the depth of that stream, and know more of its character. One of those windy days, when it blew as if the wind had not had a holiday for a year, I drove off from Stonington in the afternoon, and before dark reached a farm-house near the stream and asked for a night's lodging. I found, as I was sure I should, a warm and hospitable reception, and was made comfortable for the night in a large bed in a large room, in a wing of the house around which the wind roared all night long, until toward morning it grew tired of vainly trying to keep me awake, for I slept well, and woke with the day. By eight o'clock I found myself on the stream. I struck it in an open field, just above the swamp in the wood, and it appeared to be necessary to go through the swamp, if I would fairly try the brook. So I plunged into it boldly. It was my first trial of wet feet that year, and I had some misgivings at the first, but they all vanished at the first misstep I made, when I found myself standing in three feet of mud and water, with a coating of both over my right cheek, and a considerable quantity of the former in my left eye. It was natural. I had suddenly a sort of af home feeling. I had expe- rienced such sensations before. I was in my old business. So I plodded my way along, crushing thin ice at every step, and watching for any indications of trout. A musk rat, who made a mistake in getting on the ice instead of under it, was the first animal of the ferce 7iatur(B that I discovered. He disappeared in a large open space of water, and suspecting that there were deep spring holes thereabouts, I approached somewhat cautiously, and threw over the darkest hole under the roots of a maple.

My flies had but touched the surface, when a gentle

l6o I GO A -FISHING.

rise, followed by a heavy pull, indicated that some animal had it. I don't know what it was. It is not probable that I ever shall know. I did not see the animal. I never saw my tail fly again. Probably it was a fish ; and prob- ably, with a sagacity truly astonishing, he took a round turn with my leader around a root of the maple, to pre- vent my getting the advantage of him on a pull. What- ever course he pursued, he v^^as successful ; for when I gave it up, and pulled a steady, strong pull, I got nothing. My line came up without a tail fly, and I replaced it, and tried again on the same hole. Would you believe it, the result was exactly the same again ! — a rise, a rush, a round turn, a reasonable and patient delay, then I paid out, threw the slack over my shoulder and, taking the line in my hand, drew gently, stronger, stronger yet, and up came the leader without the fly or trout. The pool was inac- cessible, or this need not have occurred. But I could not get to it to sound it, and so I tried a third fly, and cast a third time. Sir, it was a school of trout, where they were taught to outwit fishermen. I never saw that fly either. I waited ten minutes, hoping that the trout would suppose I was gone and cast off his fast. But no. He had prob- ably found a trout-surgeon to extract the hook, while I stood there waiting, and I broke the leader, reeled up my line, and sought an open field where the fish were less knowing.

The grass was just sprouting in the meadow into which the stream debouched from the morass, and I threw over a ripple below a fall. The second or third cast was successful, and I lifted a very decent fish, weighing say three quarters of a pound. I took another out of the same ripple, and then followed the stream downward.

They seemed to be lying in pairs in all the favorable

STREAM FISHING. l6l

places. I generally got two where I got one, and sel- dom more than two. The morning wore along, and I worked slowly down stream, enjoying the air which grew softer momentarily as the sun approached the zenith. I took a dozen in the open meadow, and then entered the ravine, where the stream commenced its descent of half a mile toward salt water. In the first basin I took one larger than any I had previously caught, and then sat down to rest a while in the sunshine, which stole deli- ciously down through the branches of the leafless trees. I had a book in my pocket. It was soaked through and through, evidently at my first plunge above described, when I had filled my pocket as well as my eye with mud and water. I made a large fire, and laid the book near it to dry. I wished to save it if I could, and I left it there while I went down the stream. For company to the book I left a trout, a large, fine fellow, split and lying on a flat stone, judiciously slanting toward the blaze, and toward where the coals would be when the blaze should die away. It was an experiment. I had never tried it before in that way, and I had not over much confidence in it. But I left it to work its own success or failure, while I whipped the stream down to the railroad bridge. Before I reached the foot of the ravine the cover closed over the stream, and it was impossible to do any thing with the flies. I know many anglers who under the cir- cumstances would abandon the brook, and go on down to some more open place for a cast. I counsel no such nonsense as this. The true angler is not confined to fly- fishing as many imagine. When the fly can be used it always should be used, but where the fly is impracticable, or where fish will not rise to it, he is a very foolish an- gler who declines to use bait.

L

l62 I GO A-FISHING.

Without doubt there is quite as much skill and experi- ence necessary to the fisherman with bait as to the fish- erman with the fly. How many will call this heresy ! But let the angler who is so fond of his fly that he re- gards bait-fishing as always vulgar, try with me the dash- ing Pemigewasset, and I prophesy that in five miles of that glorious torrent he will not raise five trout to a fly, and I will have taken, following behind him, three hun- dred. Small fish, of course, for the most part, but an oc- casional half-pounder, and once in a while a larger trout. In that river they will not rise to a fly at any season. I have tried it more than a hundred times. And for that reason shall I forego the splendid scenery, the magnifi- cent ravines, the wild rush of the white torrent down its thousand feet of descent, the beautiful pools among old rocks, the long stretches of still, clear water — all the glories of the most glorious river in America? I think not. That is a stream down which it is worth an an- gler's while to go, with a short rod and short line, and a worm-bait, or the tail of a trout to tempt his fellows.

I took off my leader and flies, wound it around my hat, and replaced it with a hook and a single shot by way of sinker. A fly-rod is not the best for bait-fishing; but I had taken a somewhat stiffer rod than usual, anticipating the occasion. With three feet of line or even less I reached into deep holes under heavy bushes and fallen trees that jammed the ravine, and took out a fine lot of trout, working my way down with great difficulty, until I found myself standing on the last pile of drift-wood, from under which the stream flowed into the head of tide-wa- ter— a lagoon in the salt marsh — in which I hoped to find large salt-water trout.

Replacing my flies, I cast diligently up and down the

FOUR POUNDS. 163

Stream, but in vain. Then I came back to the bait; but now I changed it. With a small fly-hook and a bit of worm I took a minnow, and used him to entrap his en- emy the trout. Nor without success. I struck a two- pound trout, and landed him after a three-minute strug- gle. Another, not so large, and another, and yet a fourth. For each I had to catch a minnow, and it took time. I was fishing for a fifth minnow when I heard the whistle and roar of an express train a mile or so away. I looked up and forgot my hook for a moment, so that it went to the bottom. My eye was directed down the rail- road, and I saw the engine, a black spot on the track, swelling as it approached, when a sharp pull called my attention to the business in hand. He had gotten some yards of line already, and was going down stream with a rush. I felt him, and he pulled with a strong pull. " Four pounds at least," was my first idea, and down I followed him. That railroad bridge was a puzzle to me. The stream narrowed to go under it, and I had guessed its depth to be not less than four feet, with mud bottom. If the fish got through it, he had the advantage of me. So I made a dead stand, and stopped him. I tried the reel, but I could not budge him toward me. So I reeled in, while I approached him, until I had about three fath- oms out. Just then the train was approaching, and I saw three or four heads out of the windows watching my movements. As they dashed by at fifty miles an hour, I was trying to lift the fish to the surface and ascertain what he was. For though not thirty seconds had passed since he took the hook, I knew by this time he was no trout. Nor was he. I did not land him with that light rod for full ten minutes.

If the excited gentleman who was looking out of the

1 64 I GO A -FISHING.

last window of the last car of that train, and who sprang out to the platform so swiftly, and waved his hand to me with such an emphatic gesture of delight, has any curi- osity about that fish, and if he ever read this book, then these presents are to inform him that that fish was no ^rout at all. It was a bull-poiit, a cat-fish, or whatever you choose to call the ugly, devilish-looking rascals that lie in mud holes and come out to annoy respectable fish- ermen. I killed that fish. I deliberately hammered him on a stone till his head was dead. His tail, I sup- pose, is yet alive. But he will not bite again.

I returned to the rock where I had left my book and my trout. The book was there. So was Caesar, the large dog from the farm-house. So was not the trout. I had my suspicions. The dog saw that I had, and, dropping his head and tail, slunk into the cover, and did not meet me at the door when I returned to the farm- house. The book was dry, and I walked homeward with over two dozen trout, every one of them fit for a royal table. And they graced a royal table that evening, load- ed with the luxuries of country life. And when the even- ing waxed late, and the hour of separating came, I went to my room to sleep. The wind swept occasionally with a wail through the tree overhead, and rattled a loose shingle on the roof, but I slept none the less soundly and quietly.

After that I used often to fish that stream, sometimes alone, sometimes with friends.

One morning, when I was fishing the stream upward above the swamp, I found what is a noteworthy charac- teristic of many of the farms in this part of Connecticut. It seems to have been the ancient custom for the farmer to have a family burying-place on his farm. And I sup-

GRAVES IN THE THICKET. 165

pose that when the farm was sold, the title to the graves was reserved. And so it happens that on some farms there are several burial-places of different families. And I have often found little groups of graves in the most out-of-the-way places, overgrown with bushes, in dense thickets, evidently unvisited for many years, apparently forgotten utterly. No one lives to tend them. No one cares for the memory of the sleeping family. It is some- what curious to stand by such graves. One recalls in imagination a distant past, and wonders again and again as he thinks how wholly the generations of men pass out of memory. There were tears and sobs and all the emotions of sorrowing human nature once by these graves. As each was opened and closed, and a new treasure committed to the ground, the same grief was manifested, the same old mournful utterances were heard where now the bird sings unmolested. The young and the old died then as now. In the farm-house, which strangers occupy, there have been sad scenes enacted in old days.

As I pressed my way through dense cover on the bank of the brook, I found my passage blocked by a row of grave-stones. The bushes were tangled and thick above, and the moss was green and wet on them, and no in- scription was visible. I picked up a stone, and rubbed it over the surface of one of them, and so there began to be visible enough to show me that it was the resting- place of Faith , who died in 1772, aged eighteen

years. There were some lines below, hidden where the strong stems of the bushes were crowded close to the stone, and I could not press them back sufficiently far to clean the moss and read the epitaph. I could only make out parts of some words, but I discovered the let-

l66 I GO A-FISHING.

ters HAP — , and that word so often found in such places

PEACE.

When the light of those young eyes faded there must have been deep grief in the cottage. Might I not muse and weave a story, standing in the thicket by her grave ? She was past all harm from gossiping stor3^-teller. She whose pure young life would have been marred if any one had ventured to talk too freely of her living. But death, while it sanctifies, makes the dead a sort of pos- session of all the world. We take our dead out of the house, and out of the family circle, and lay them in the open congregation, and mark their names for all the world to read, and if that means any thing, it surely means that the world may now talk of them, for they are beyond reach of injury from mortal voice.

She who sleeps in the thicket was eighteen years among the trees that are now overshadowing the cottage. I have seen the trees, and they must have been old and stout and broad when she was living. Her name was Faith, a good old name, common in Connecticut, and I dare to think that she was worthy of it. It is a pleasant name for a young girl, implying trustful confidence. Did she not grow up among the beautiful things of earth ? Did she not learn to love them all ? There can be no purer life on earth than that of the young girl who lives in the quiet home of a country farm-house, learning little except of nature, and taught by the country pastor to look always up to God from his works. Do you remem- ber what Sir Thomas Overbury wrote of the " Faire and happy milk maide ?"

" She dares go alone and unfold sheep in the night, and fears no manner of ill, for she means none. She is never alone, for she is always accompanied with old songs,

THE farmer's daughter. 167

honest thoughts and prayers ; short ones, but they have their efficacy ! Her dreams are so chaste that she dare tell them. Only a Friday's dream is her superstition. That she conceals. Thus lives she, and her only care is that she may die in spring-time, to have store of flowers stuck upon her winding-sheet."

I need not deny that I thought of that description when I was standing by the grave in the thicket. How could I help thinking of it ? Perhaps it had to do with my im- aginations also. Thus they went on.

The farmer's daughter grew up, beautiful and beloved. In the morning she saw the sun rise from the sea, and her young thoughts went wandering to the far East, and she remembered the story of the Passion. In the evening, tired with her day's work, she saw the starlight on the water, and drank in the beauty of the night as one by one the stars went down the sky, and by the intuition of youth, not unaided by some sorrowful experiences even in her young life, she learned that the bright and beautiful things of earth go out one by one, but that to the patient watch- er, even in cloudy nights, there will come other visions of beauty, other stars to be bright and shining in their turn, and that there is a to-morrow, when the blue will be as beautiful and the stars as clear. Patience is the lesson of the star-watchers. The old Chaldean learned it when the stars were younger than now. I have seen the Bed- ouin, lying prone on the desert sand, studying the unceas- ing revolution of the sky, and learning the same lesson. Why might not Faith, the young girl in Connecticut, learn it as well } This is all a fancy story you know, but let us give rein to fancy. She grew up exceeding fair and beau- tiful. The sunshine kissed her cheek only to give it the bloom of a rose. Her eye borrowed the color of the

l68 I GO A- FISHING.

night sky she loved to gaze at. Her hair was curled by the loving fingers of the wind. Invisible spirits of earth and forest and sea-shore surrounded and guarded her. It is not necessary to be a " Spiritualist" to believe in spirits. Draw the line correctly. We all believe in spir- its. Few are so skeptical as not to believe in spiritual in- fluences and communications. The great point is that we can not exchange converse with them. There is the boundary between the visible and the invisible world. They hear us, they see us, they may even know our thoughts, and fully appreciate our longings. But they are forbidden to tell us the mystery of the dividing wall between us, and as to their escaping the prohibition by thunderous raps on pine tables, or the smashing of furni- ture about our legs, it is nonsense. If some interpreter will rise to tell me what the voices are which float on the sea-wind at night, and fill my ear and soul with, melody, and with emotions that I can not understand; if some seer will explain to me why the rays of yonder star, rising above the hills, make me so resdess that I can not sit, but must walk up and down the gallery, and think and think and think, as a swift-crowding, crushing host of memories and hopes and fears and wild untrained fancies go through my brain ; if some one of spirit lore will come to me and tell me that the day and night are full of spir- itual voices, and give me the key to unlock sunshine and starlight, and possess the messages they bring ; if there be any one who will take for me one message, and bring me back one answer, from a silver-haired old man who has gone to God and stands now before his throne, white- robed, a message that will tell me how I may henceforth talk with him as of old, and gather counsels in times of agony as I used to gather them at his feet when all our

THE YOUNG GIRL FAITH. 169

lives were peaceful, let the wise man make himself known, and I alone with my own hands will build him a temple where men shall worship his memory for ages to come. 1 know that the spirits who inhabit the universe of their Maker and Master are around us. I know that they sug- gest thoughts, whisper memories and hopes, talk to us, but, alas ! not with us. I ask them — and they answer not. I beseech them, and they make no reply. I talk to them. They talk to me. But there is no question and response. I question the shadows as well as the sunlight, the storm as well as the evening breath of balm, but until I put off this clothing of the earth that is so earthy, I have no hope for spiritual converse.

But Faith lies sleeping in the thicket, and I get on but slowly with her story. How old she would be now if she had lived ! More than a hundred years, if I remember the date aright. It was, I think, 1772 or thereabouts. That was when Jonathan Trumbull was Governor of Con- necticut. They were stirring times, and the farmers along the coast knew something of the vicissitudes of war. For the French and Spanish quarrel had brought trouble and sorrow, with some loss, into the Connecticut homes. One can hardly imagine how people lived here in those times. The farmer's family, over yonder in the heart of the coun- try, had but little communication with the world. New York was weeks away, Boston as far, and neither New York nor Boston was of special account as a place of news in those days. New London was a much more im- portant port to the people hereabouts than any city on this side of the Atlantic. Old London was months dis- tant. The government was far off, but it began to be felt about this time. I wonder whether the farmer's daughter wasted much time in thinking of the queen, if there was a

170 I GO A-FISHING.

queen — and I can not stop now to remember whether there was. Did the young girl weave romances about her " sovereign lady ?" It seems odd to think of a New En- gland girl looking up to the British throne for the example of all that was womanly, and teaching herself loyalty to the king's wife beyond the sea. Let us not wonder. We will tell our own story about her, and believe it as we tell it. It is just as well so. What, after all, is the need of knowledge in such matters ? I like not this way men have of demanding proof of every thing before they believe it. Her name was Faith, and I tell you faith is the substance of things that we wish. Men go prowling around a story, a tradition, a history, and demand evidence of every state- ment, pick flaws in every weak place, and refuse to be- lieve except they have evidence, and believe when they think they have it. And yet the fundamental point in evidence is faith. Nothing can be proved without taking for the starting-point blind, absolute faith. Forgetting this is the blunder that men are making in their rational- istic theories about the Bible and the Christian religion. They attempt to overthrow, and some of them to their own satisfaction do overthrow, the Bible as a rule of faith and practice, and as a history too, because they demand evidence which is sufficient to satisfy them, and say they can not find it. Why, man, your own existence is known to you only by faith. Feeling is faith. Seeing is faith. Hearing is faith. Every sense you have depends on faith. You say a man said " Yes." I deny it, and say that he said " No." You say you heard it. I deny that you even have the sense of hearing. You only imagine you hear. You say you saw him speak. I deny it ; you only imagine you saw him speak. You have no hearing — no senses ; you do not exist at all : your body is a myth ; your local

FAITH. 171

existence is a pure fancy ; there is no such thing as a man, a world, a universe. If it does exist, it is all but a microscopic affair ; its size is no larger than the millionth part of a drop of water, within which millions of animal- cules live their lives and die their deaths as you and I do. How can you prove that all this is false ? Why, only by your faith. You must take something on trust, you must believe something on blind faith, in every attempt of hu- man reason, as the foundation of every argument, on every subject on earth or in the world of spirits. And who are you, rationalist, infidel, liberal reasoner, whatever you call yourself, who are you to tell me how much or how little I am to take on faith ? This truth that I am teach- ing you is as old as the Aristotleian days ; it is the old truth that has been hurled in the teeth of rationalists in every century since the jargon at Babel, and yet there are always men who go about the world ridiculing faith and preaching the age of reason. I would rather believe every thing that is not harder to believe than to disbelieve. This much I do ; I take it on blind faith, absolute, indis- putable, that this Book is the word of God, inspired of God, and I defy the stoutest reasoner of all the modern schools to make me doubt that, any more than I should doubt my own existence.

In the great contest now and always going on in the world, the defenders of the faith, good men who strike boldly for the truth, nevertheless allow themselves to be led off from their vantage-ground by the rationalists. They are eager to defend, but they go down into the open field of reason with the men who attack them, and lose half the battle by so doing. Their shield is faith. The breastwork behind which they fight is faith. Let them stand there, and no rationalist can touch them with any

172 I GO A- FISHING.

weapon. The answer to all arguments of skepticism is "I believe." "Why do I believe" did you ask, my ra- tionalistic friend? Ah, my dear sir, faith is the gift of God. I am not one of your sort who go about bothering for reasons. I believe. You laugh at me .? I can stand that. You sneer ? I can stand that. You know nothing of the sublime meaning of the words " I believe." All the results of argument, study, laborious investigation, human reason, can but produce in the human mind this conviction, to wit, " I think ;" or possibly this, " For the present and until further investigation show other truths I believe." But that is not faith. I would give more for the simple operation of a child's mind who says, " I be- lieve it because my mother told me so," than for your firmest convictions based on the most patient investiga- tions and the universal concord of the schools. If the good men of our day who are fighting this battle. with ra- tionalism, would but intrench themselves in the citadel of faith, the contest would cease. Rationalism could not approach them. Nor would it, in that case, gain so many of the uneducated people of the world. For faith is ten- fold more winning than reason. A man who believes and shows that he believes is more powerful than one who reasons, and shows himself ready to abandon his faith when he hears better reasons.

In the ordinary affairs of life few men believe because of reason. Faith, in the commonest subjects, is without reason. If one were asked why he believed in the con- quests of Alexander the Great, he would reply because of history. But his faith in historical accounts is not faith based on reason or evidence. On the contrary, it would not take five minutes to show him that a few old manu- scripts, not dating very far back, hunted out and printed

THE FAITH OF CICERO. I73

in the fifteenth century, form but a loose basis for " rea- sonable " faith. Nevertheless his faith is not shaken by discovering how weak is its foundation in reason. It is far easier to show men that they have no ground for be- lieving the accepted history of Greece and Rome, than to overthrow the trustworthiness of the histories bearing the names of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John ; but men will believe the profane history in spite of arguments which show that it lacks evidence, and men will believe the sa- cred history though all the powers of reason seek to un- dermine their faith.

Here then is a mental force, faculty, action, call it what you will, which is not within the understanding of ration- alism, and with which it has no weapons to deal. The grandeur of the position, " I believe that I am immortal," is above the appreciation of reason, beyond the province of reason even to attack. You who think reason the highest faculty of the human soul have to learn that there is yet a higher, namely, faith which is the gift of God. I know none higher, since it smiles serenely at impotent reason, it alone takes hold of the supernatural, and brings the unseen and eternal within the inspection, the knowl- edge, the affection, the devotion of humanity.

Sneer at this faith of mine if you will, for surely I care not now and shall not care hereafter. I say with Cicero, " Quod si in hoc erro (quod animos hominum immortales esse credam), libentur erro ; nee mihi hunc errorem quo delector, dum vivo extorqueri volo ; sin mortuus (ut qui- dam minuti philosophi censent) nihil sentiam, non vereor ne hunc errorem meum mortui philosophi irrideant."

In yonder thicket is a grave. The headstone tells me that a young girl was buried there a hundred years ago. Do you want proof that the headstone tells the truth ?

174 I GO A- FISHING.

Dig down and you will find no dust of humanity there. You will doubt whether it ever was there ; I will still be- lieve it was. I think the dust that was once fair human- ity, blue eyes and ruddy cheeks, white breasts and rosy fingers, has grown up in flowers and leaves of trees, and has gone wandering on the winds of heaven ; and I be- lieve— I want none of your reasoning — I believe because the book of my faith tells me so, that that dust once held enshrined an immortal soul, that now lives and will live when there will be no more sun and sea. And I believe too that the day will come when God, sitting on his white throne, will call that wandering dust from distant hills and valleys, gathering dust to dust again, and that the young girl will stand up fair and beautiful by the stream, and pass to the place ap'pointed for her. And this I believe, just as I believe from the words on the head-stone that she was buried there after eighteen years of life in the old times, when Jonathan Trumbull was Governor of Connec- ticut. That is faith. You need not argue about it. I take it on faith, and am content. More content, I ven- ture to say, than you are with any results of your reason- ing. Nay, you have no results. Reason only leads you to the point that all is doubtful. You can be sure of nothing, except by taking something as true on blind faith.

But for that faith what sad and solemn memories would those be, which are now bright and cheerful, of the be- loved ones who rest in peace.

In the years that are gone many times I have fished that stream and other streams in company with two brothers and a sister, in whose holy memory I have writ- ten every word of this book. There is nothing left of them here but memory. It is very beautiful. They rest in peace. That is the word !

PEACE. 175

It was the word that I found on the grave-stone of the girl Faith in the thicket by the trout-brook. It is the word which every mountain-brook, every breaking ripple on a lake-shore, every voice of the wind whispers to the angler who goes along thinking of companions that are gone. Over all the tempestuous waves of human sorrow it comes with the melody of his voice, and the waves obey him. There is no better illustration of the manner in which heaven-expecting men in all ages have longed for peace, have prized it and sought it as a blessing to poor human- ity, than is found in the fact that from the remotest times in the East it has been the burden of those salutations, as we call them, which men exchange. More than thirty centuries ago, when Jacob met the servants of Laban he inquired, " Is it peace with him ?" For such is the cor- rect rendering of the Hebrew which in our version is trans- lated " Is it well with him V When Moses met Jethro they inquired after one another's peace. And to this day in the Oriental countries the common salutation is the blessing " Peace be with you," and the answer " Be it peace."

In old times it was a word that seemed to belong emi- nently to our faith. We do not find it often in Greek and Roman authors, nor did they seem to look to it as the blessing of this or the joy of the other life.

Horace bade Dellius

"iEquam memento rebus in aiduis Servare mentem — "

Because an equable temper of mind and life was, in his opinion, best suited to men who looked forward only to exile beyond an unknown sea :

176 ' I GO A- FISHING.

" Omnes eodem cogimur : omnium Versatur urna ; serius, ocius Sors exitura, et nos in aeternum Exilium impositura cymbae."

But the Christian fathers loved to ring the changes on the word.

Bernard wrote : " Quid dabis nobis Domine ? Pacem, inquit, do vobis, pacem meam relinqui vobis. Sufficit mihi Domine ! Gratanter suscipio quod relinquis. Pa- cem enim volo, pacem desidero nee aliquid amplius quae- re. Cui non sufficit pax, non sufficis tu Domine, qui es pax vera, pax nostra."

Augustine said : " Pax est serenitas mentis, tranquilitas animi, simpHcitas cordis, vinculum amoris, consortium ca- ritatis."

Jerome, writing of how hard it is to attain, said : " Pax querenda est ut bella fugiamus, nee sufficiat eam querere nisi inventam fugientem que omni studio persequamur."

Isidorus described it : " Pax est plebis sanitas, gloria sacerdotis, patriae letitia, et terror hostium visibilium et invisibilium."

Ambrose said : " Pax est dux at vitam eternam inveni- endam et habendam."

Thus they all spoke of the peace that blesses the soul here, but of the peace that is there they were never weary of talking and writing, in ever-varying phrases of joyful expectancy. Bernard of Clugny, the monk who contrast- ed this world's sins with that world's glories, summed it all up in the lines,

" Pax sine crimine, pax sine turbine, pax sine rixa Meta laboribus, atque tumultibus anchora fixa."

Who that has studied the numerous epitaphs of the

IRENE IN PACE. 1 77

early Christian era which have been found in the Roman Catacombs and elsewhere, has failed to notice how fre- quently the word was used there to give expression to the dearest hope of the Christian living for the Christian dead.

Lounging along the Vatican Gallery one day I was struck with the double use of the word in one of the old stelcE from the Catacombs. Irene in pace. Her name was peace, and she rests in peace. Irene has been at peace well-nigh two thousand years. Who was Irene? Little matters it now on earth, but this I read on the stone, that life was then as now somewhat storm}^, some- what tiresome, somewhat wearying. Then as now, the young and gentle, the old and worn, longed for repose. Then as now, the voice of affection hushed the wailing of sorrow with that tender whisper, peace, peace.

It was a word that men loved, even in old Rome. And when the hand of affection would trace the utmost of consolation over the grave of the dead Irene, it was only able to say, she is at peace ! No more struggling or sorrowing, no more working or wearying, no more sleepless nights and agonizing days. Did she live in the stormy times of the early kings ? It matters not, for she is at peace. Did she sit watching by the window for a coming footstep from the North, in the days when the great Julius fought in Gaul, and waiting vainly, did she die of lonesomeness ? It avails nothing to know, for she has long lain at peace. O blessed word, that Roman mothers whispered over their children, whose sound yet thrills the hearts of sad women and world-worn men, the word that sums up all the hopes of the mortal, all the im- aginations of immortal joys !

M

X.

AMONG THE FRANCONIA MOUNTAINS.

The dawn was not yet visible over Eagle Cliff when I awoke, and, opening my window, stepped out on the bal- cony. The silence which held possession of the valley was profound. There was no voice of any kind of life, nor was there a breath of wind stirring tree or leaf. More than six hundred persons were sleeping in the Profile House and its surrounding buildings, but for aught that was audible the Franconia notch might have been as desolate as it was two hundred years ago.

The early morning is to me the most charming portion of a mountain day. I blame no one for sleeping late. The luxury of that half- sleeping half- waking hour, the only time when one knows he is asleep, and appreciates it, is beyond all dispute. No one has clung to it more tenaciously than I. In town, where waking is waking to the rough sounds of the city, to morning smoke and rat- tling milk-wagons and shrieking hucksters, and the thou- sand indications that the feeding of the beasts is the first thing in a New York morning before work commences, I, too, have kept my head to the pillow with exceeding comfort in the consciousness that I was asleep, and great satisfaction in the thousand times reiterated assurance that I need not wake yet.

But in travel and in the mountains and forests the

MORNING ON ECHO LAKE. 179

early morning is more delicious out of doors than in bed. True, it is always a subject of brief argument. When one first wakes he says this is pleasant, to lie here both awake and asleep, but is it not pleasanter to be outside and broad awake ; and I seldom fail to settle the argu- ment before the sun comes up to throw light on it.

The most lasting memories of scenery appear to me those which one has of early morning views. Sunlight and broad daylight have a sameness that seldom makes an impression. We remember scenes in them, but we do not remember or take much note of the lights on the scenes. Dawn is always beautiful, and one is seldom like the dawn of any other day. This variety in an event which is forever occurring and re-occurring in ev- ery twenty-four hours is something wonderful. Even if each day of a long series be clear and cloudless, there is still something different each morning in the shade of light and in the line of its direction. To-day the first ray will brighten like the northern streamers through yonder gap in the mountain ridge. To-morrow the first silver stream will glide like a dream around the other side of the peak. Now it will come pouring down on the still beauty of Echo Lake from the one side of La- fayette, and another day it will flash suddenly into the valley through the rift near the Eagle Cliffs. Morning after morning you will have watched the mountain-tops to see which one first welcomes the coming light, and you will have made up your mind that there is an old-es- tablished affection between the Dawn and Cannon Mount- ain, when lo ! this morning you will see the dark masses of rock and the wild ruin of forest that lies dead, and terrible in death, on the Artist's Bluff, gloomy, fierce, tangled, looking like the matted hair of a black-browed

l80 I GO A- FISHING.

giant slumbering away a night of drunkenness, you will see this monster's forehead grow suddenly serene and holy as the white fingers of the morning wander among the shaggy locks of his brown hair, and day bends down lovingly over him, first of all the sleepers, and blesses his drunken slumber with her pure kiss.

If you never saw mountains wake out of the darkness when the morning is yet far off, you have something to see in this world yet.

Shall I ever forget a night on the Mediterranean, when the steamer went plunging northward before a fierce sirocco, and all the sea and sky in the blackness of the darkness were hideously confused and confounded. I stood on deck, with the spray going over me at every roll of the ship, while now and then a monster came up to the stern and hissed as he sent his blue folds over the deck, and the ship quivered and moaned. All around there was nothing visible but this wild confusion of black- ness, out of which the waves lifted up their hands, and the floods called in tones of thunder. And then, sudden- ly as if a star had broken through clouds, high up in the eastern sky there was a vision of something white and pure and holy that was indeed only a star at first, but grew rapidly into a greater form, and shone as moonlight shines on a distant ripple of the sea, and then another and another and another white light came out of the gloom, and at last the great white waves of snow-clad Lebanon rolled along the eastern horizon.

The proper way for one who loves fine scenery to be- gin the day here is to go at daylight to Echo Lake, and he should be on Profile Lake at and after sunset. In both cases he will be nearly alone. On Echo Lake I have never yet met a human being before seven in the

EVENING ON PROFILE LAKE. l8l

morning, and I have seen the day grow into full light there a hundred times. On Profile Lake during the aft- ernoon all the boats are out, and noisy groups of happy people are scattered here and there until toward seven o'clock. Then you will generally see only three boats, my friend Dupont's, that of Mr. C , and my own.

Nor will either of us disturb the silence in which you will best enjoy the wonderful solemnity of beauty which surrounds you. As in the morning the mountain-top first met the fair face of the young day, so in the evening the mountain-tops are last to sink into darkness, but they do not seem to be the same mountains. They were joyous then, for day came pure and white and stainless. They are sombre and gloomy and profoundly sad in the even- ing when they see day going down in the West, her face red with passion or flushed with wine. For oh man ! never went day to rest unstained — never was Morning born so pure that she retained herself in purity till the setting of the sun — never yet came Daughter of the East with chariot wheels of silver, a fair and noble maiden, worth love and winning love, that she did not go away in clouds, with torn garments or in blushing shame.

I said we would not disturb you. You must have quick

ears to hear any sound when either C or Dupont

throw fifty feet of line on the lake, for they use light rods, and there is an absolute perfection of beauty in the curves described by their lines. Now and then the sharp rise and swirl of a trout may attract your attention for an instant as one or another strikes him, but go on thinking while we go on fishing. If, indeed, you be an angler, join us and welcome, for then it is known to you that no man is in perfect condition to enjoy scenery unless he have a fly-rod in his hand and a fly-book in his pocket.

l82 . I GO A-FISHING.

I Stood on the balcony of my window and waited for the coming of the day. For I had agreed, the evening previous, with my artist friend the Baron, to go in the early morning over the lower slope of Cannon Mountain into the forest and pass two days there, he to make studies of ancient birch-trees and masses of moss and groups of fallen monarchs of the forest which lay there around, and I to kill time as I best might on a certain wild lake known only to a few of us.

Long before the sun was visible over the cliffs we were off and climbing the steep mountain-side. The first ray of sunshine fell on us half-way up the hill, and lit the ragged sides of an ancient birch, so that it fairly gleamed with brown and gold, while in the middle of a bright spot of bark was a medallion head of Queen Elizabeth, the work of a worm who little knew what he was about in sculpture.

From the road to the lake side was an hour and a half, chiefly up the side of the mountain. The lake was like a picture— calm, placid, waiting for us. Too calm for trout, but nevertheless very enticing.

Dupont and myself, who have for many years fished these waters together, had sent up our India-rubber rafts (before mentioned in this volume), and had used them two or three times previously on the lake, leaving them on the shore, where, in this wild mountain region, they were as safe as if locked up at the Profile House.

Hiram and Frank (our men) set themselves at once to work on a bark camp for the night, and after determining on its location and suggesting some ideas in the archi- tecture, I "blew up" my raft and went a-fishing.

A year previous, on the same day of the month, the Bar- on and myself, with a friend, had discovered trout in this

FLAVOR OF TROUT. 183

lake, and killed a fine lot of large fish. We brought into the Profile House that evening forty-five fish, weighing thirty-nine pounds. Every one of those forty-five fish was taken on a scarlet ibis or a white moth. They would not rise to any other fly. A year had passed, the day was precisely similar in weather and atmosphere, but no trout, large or small, would rise to either of those flies. Yet there were thousands of trout in the lake, as I knew well. I tried several flies of the sort usually best suited to these waters, but could not get a rise. I began to despair. At length I put on for the stretcher a small fly, tied for me at Inverness — a crimson body, with shining jet-black wings, each wing tipped with pure white. At the first cast of that fly up came the first trout, a half-pounder. To this fly the small trout rose freely. But no large fish would be coaxed up. I took a dozen fair-sized fish, and then drifted idly about the lake till noon. The Baron was off in the forest, and would not be in camp till even- ing. I had nothing to do but fish or study the forest and the lake. Fishing was without object, since I had already taken all that we could eat, and if I took more they would not be fresh the next day.

I never attempt to send trout from the forest to friends in town, excepting when I have a special request from some one who desires them. A trout is seldom fit to eat the day after he is taken. In the city we know nothing about the true flavor of this delicate fish, and hence many persons are surprised at the high praise bestowed on them. It is not so strange that a good taste pronounces trout, as ordinarily found in the city, or received there in ever so careful packing, an inferior fish for the table. There are a dozen varieties of fish in the New York market which are better than trout can ever be there.

184 I GO A- FISHING.

The flavor of trout varies in various waters. Where streams run through much low ground and forest, or through bog-land, and where lakes have muddy bottoms, with dead and decaying wood in the water, the fishy in- habitants are apt to have what we call a woody flavor. This is not always the case. I have taken trout of very fine, pure flavor from the worst looking water, but not often. A woody trout, if eaten at all, should be eaten within a few hours after he is taken. It is practically impossible to send such trout to a distant city, or to preserve them in ice for many hours. The unpleasant flavor increases rapidly.

The best of trout suffer by keeping, even in ice ; and I strongly advise those who go a-fishing in distant parts to kill no more fish than they can eat, and to forego the pleas- ure of sending evidences of their success to friends, who may possibly be convinced of the fish stories they have heard by the sight of the " speckled beauties," but who, if their taste be educated, can not enjoy the result.

Why should I kill any more trout on that day ? I had five or six pounds, enough for three of us, with the addi- tions to our dinner which Hiram's pack contained, and here was the lake from which we were as sure of taking our breakfast as if it were a kit of salt mackerel.

So I went up to the head of the lake, where a brook comes in over a white gravel bed, pure and clear and cold, and, lying down on the beach in the soft sunshine, dreamed away the day. The night came on us with clouds, and the sounds of wind in the higher forests on the mountain sides. We made the camp-fire broad and high. Vast pine and birch logs, ten feet long and two feet thick, which with great labor Hiram had cut and rolled together, blazed high in the edge of the forest, and poured a rich light over the lake. Far out on the water

OLD FRIENDS. 185

I could see now and then the dip and lift of a lily pad, gleaming like a ruby. The Baron had been all day sketch- ing, but had come in at dusk, hung his sketches here and there on trees, and, as we both had good appetites, we dined sumptuously. Then we talked by the camp-fire for a while, and then he threw himself down on the balsam boughs under the bark shelter, and slept in peace.

While memory is aroused so frequently by similarities of time and place, it is sometimes excited by the very re- verse state of facts, the total dissimilarity. I thought of camp-fires like this by which I had slept in other days, but these thoughts were brief, rapid, evanescent as the tall flames of the fire, leaping into light and vanishing to be followed by others in quick succession. And then, as I lay down with my head resting on a birch log waiting to be burned, the wind all gone, save only as I heard the sound far off on Cannon Mountain, the great fire sinking slowly till the heap of glowing logs gave out few flames, and the red light shone on the trunks of great trees about me, I found myself surrounded by a group of swarthy- faced men, with dark and flashing eyes, on whose every countenance I saw the light of faithful affection.

I am not quite clear that there was any very remarkable coincidence in the fact that these old Arab friends sur- rounded me that night, and that on my return to the Pro- file House next day I met with late intelligence from them. Besides the general truth that the angler has opportunity to think, and naturally, when alone in the forest, calls his friends around him, it is more than possible that a re- mark made by a passing acquaintance on the evening previous had led to this assemblage. For a gentleman recently returned from Europe and the East had said to me, "I met your friend Steenburger at Alexandria. He

l86 I GO A-FISHING.

talked of coming home this summer." John had been some years absent, and latterly had neglected his corre- spondence, and so this remark had set me to thinking of him when I was alone in the woods, and it was natural enough to remember our Oriental friends.

In what little travel I have been able to accomplish in my life, I have made more warm friendships, and won more close attachments among the Mohammedans than any where else. Having passed among them but little more time than scores of other travelers, it has neverthe- less happened to me to form pleasant relations with men in various classes, and I look now to Egypt and Syria as countries in which I have warmer friends than perhaps in any other part of the world out of America.

I have not to thank myself for this. There was one, who was always with me in visits to the East, whose stead- fast kindness and loveliness won the devotion of the v/arm Arab heart, and whose memory is kept green on the Nile banks and in the Holy City.

And these sons of Ishmael and Esau, dark-faced men with flashing eyes, gathered around me that night in the outer edges of the fire-light. Sheik Houssein Ibn Egid sat there, wrapped in his black cloth cloak, with the crim- son and gold caftan shining under it. Grand old son of Abraham, who serves always when I read my Bible as the representative of the patriarch, for I have no doubt that he was just such a man in appearance, and in walk and manner of life. His keen eye does not any longer look from the hills above Wady Mousa, scanning the des- ert for signs of the enemy. The hand which was so gentle, yet so firm on the rein of his sorrel mare, the hand which— as I once heard him defiantly tell Mustapha Kap- itan to tell Said Pasha — could by a toss in the air of a

HASSANEIN. 1S7

handful of dust call five thousand men to the saddle, that hand is lying now under his cheek, and the grim old warrior sleeps with his face set toward Mecca. I remem- bered a morning in the City of Victory, when Sheik Hous- sein rode by Miriam into the great crowd near the Suk Khalil, where Islam by myriads waited the procession of the Makhmil, and where in other years no Christian face dared show itself. But the slight form of the fair-faced American, and her uncovered countenance, provoked only silent curses, no open insult, for the Bedouin by her side was the terror of desert and city alike, and no man or woman dared to whisper an insult to her in his presence.

There was Abd-el-Kader, the most polished of Oriental gentlemen, who ruled with great skill and justice the provinces of Upper Egypt, and who, after accompanying the British army on the Abyssinian expedition, returned to Cairo to die, just before I had hoped to take his hand there and thank him for old kindnesses.

There was Yusef of Luxor, sheik of the old mosque that stands near the ruined temple, who is one of the kindest and most devout yet humble follower^ of Moham- med ; a man among them who reminds you of a sincere and earnest country minister in America, seeking good and doing good. And with him old Mustapha — Mus- tapha of Luxor. Who that has been there does not know him .'' And as these men of Luxor came out of the forest I saw a crowd of darker faces, and — why — that clear-cut face, that bright keen eye, that black but comely counte- nance— surely that is Hassanein !

All the charm of the angler's life would be lost but for these hours of thought and memory. All along a brook, all day on lake or river, while he takes his sport he thinks. All the long evenings in camp or cottage or inn he tells

l88 I GO A-FISHING.

Stories of his own life, hears stories of his friends' lives, and if alone calls up the magic of memory.

I can see myself now as that night, the fire blazing twenty feet high, the great trunks glowing and flashing, myself lying in the heap of logs which were waiting to be burned, comfortable, having lapsed by degrees into this and that hollow, until I was as perfectly supported as if lying on a Damascus diwan, and I can see Hassanein too, as he stood, black but comely, under a great birch-tree in the edge of the fire-light.

I was drifting one night down the moonlit Nile, my boatmen having just finished a rough-and-tumble fight with the Arabs of Saboa, a Nubian village. It was a night of exceeding beauty and glory. On the cabin deck there was a sofa, cushioned softly ; and on that I lay at night, rolled up if it were cold, but generally with only my Syrian cloak around me, looking up at the stars of Egypt. That night, late as it was, I could not sleep, and so I sat myself down to think of the ancient splendor of the Val- ley of Lions, and gradually falling back in my seat, I was at length lying down under the blue sky, and the voices of the angry villagers died away far up the stream. For a half-hour the men pulled steadily at the oars, and then, laying them in, stowed themselves in all manner of curi- ous heaps about the forward deck, and sank into that deep sleep that characterizes the Arabs, while the boat swept on with the current, her head now up, now down the stream, now east, now west, and only the dark form of Hassanein, the Nubian pilot, was visible above the deck. He stood firm at his post, holding the tiller ; and I could see his quick black eye flashing like a star as he watched the shore and the river.

Hassanein was a native of a small village a few miles

HASSANEIN. 1 89

above Es-Souan. He was a tall, slightly-framed Nubian, black as ink, but with well-cut features, and a keen, intel- ligent look that was fully up to the mark of any first offi- cer I have ever seen on a Yankee schooner. Not that he was as quick or as sharp as a Yankee. Not a bit of it. But he looked so, and if he had been educated in Con- necticut he would have been so. As it was, he was the most reliable man on the boat, and the Reis having been in disgrace long ago, he was virtually the captain.

There was a touch of romance about him. I saw that soon after he came on board at the Cataract, and I was given to talking with him when the opportunity occurred, for I found no small amount of information about the river stowed away in his shaven skull. " Hassanein," I said, in a low voice. "Ya, Howadji," was the inquiring response. My Ar- abic was not worth mentioning, and Hassanein never knew a word of English till we taught him to say " good- morning," and there his acquisitions ended. But I had acquired a knack of understanding the signs which they use very ably, and with my half-dozen Arabic words to ask questions, and my ability to understand some others, I could maintain a tolerable conversation with them. " Have you a wife, Hassanein ?" "I? No, Howadji." " How is that ? Why not ?"

Hassanein sighed, and looked down on the deck. I turned over on my sofa and looked at him, and thereby he understood that I waited for an answer. At length it came. He talked slowly at first, then vehemently, and I lay and listened. I translated what he said somewhat in this wise :

When Hassanein was a boy he was very much like oth-

190 I GO A- FISHING.

er boys. The world produces not dissimilar specimens of humanity in different parts of its rugged surface. Here was a boy like the son of a poor farmer in America, born to poverty, but born with some degree of hope beyond the small circle of his home — beyond the hills that inclosed the narrow valley of the Nile. Why not ? Is there any reason why an Egyptian boy should have less ambition now than had one who led the armies of the valley across the mountains of Syria and up to the summits of Leba- non ? Not such, however, was the ambition of Hassanein. No dreams of power or pomp of arms — no thought of gorgeous halls and Aladdin palaces haunted his waking thoughts or sleeping fancies. Sometimes, he said, there did come into his brain a strange, wild vision. He could not describe it. He did not understand it himself. He only remembered that when a passing boat brought news to the village of the splendor of Ibrahim Pacha's career, he had a strange impulse to go with him to the ends of the earth, and he went. For days and weeks he floated down the ancient river on a loaded boat, and at last reached Cairo and saw the armies of the great warrior preparing for the Syrian campaign.

I did not fully understand in what capacity Hassanein went to Syria. It was not as a soldier; perhaps it was as servant to some officer of the army. Enough that when the triumphant march took place through the Holy Land he went along the way. It was strange to hear him speak so carelessly of places that are so renowned. It was pleasant to lie and hear a man talk of Jerusalem and the plains of the Holy Land, naming them indeed by Arab names, but names that I had already learned well, and talking of them only as illustrating the swift career of the great son of Mohammed Ali.

HASSANEIN. IQI

It was at the village of Jenin on the plain of Jezreel that the Nubian boy lost his heart. She was a star, that Syrian girl, and to him as unapproachable as any star that shines above us. They were there some weeks, and he often saw her at the well — the spring that gushes out so gloriously from its long covered passage in the very centre of the place. He would sit there hours to see her but a moment. He had never seen the faces of women before. They had no hesitation in permitting his glance there, his gaze; and, in fact, the tall dark-eyed girl learned with a girl's quickness to look for his admiration, and re- joiced in lashing the poor Nubian boy with her quick eyes and smiles.

It would seem too much like a love-story were I to tell you of his writhings under that delicious torture. It was enough for him to learn that she was a Naza7'e7ie^ one of the despised and hated followers of Christ (known to this day as Nazara), to feel the impossibility of calling her his wife even were he other than a poor Nubian. He was a Mussulman, believing in God and Mohammed, and he would die such, poor though he was ; but for her he felt that he could deny the Prophet and forfeit heaven, were that of any avail.

Again I say why not ? That Nubian boy's heart was made in the same mould with Adam's, the same with mine and yours. It beat to the same time that the first heart learned in the warm walks of Eden, to the same pulsations that were once answered by the throbbing breast of Eve. He loved as men have always loved, poor or rich, and like many (how many !) he loved in vain. Alas the day !

It was not the old story — it was far w^orse. It was a half-muttered tale of horrible outrage, terrible wrong. He

192 I GO A-FISHING.

knew little about it himself: the end he knew. He awoke from a dream of madness and found himself standing over the dead body of his superior, and the fair but life- less form of his Syrian girl. Her soul had fled from her polluted body, and he had avenged her wrong with his own life. He was seized, bound, beaten till life was well- nigh gone, and then escaped and crawled back a weary way to the sea-coast, and — he scarcely knew how — found himself in Egypt. There again he was apprehended; but by chance an appeal to Ibrahim Pacha in person, as he rode through the streets, resulted in his discharge and freedom. He had been a sailor on the river ever since. He was not married — he did not wish to be yet — perhaps he might some day — and at this point in his story the boat brought up with a short jerk on a sand-bank. Has- sanein sprang to his helm, and shouted to wake up Has- san Shelalee, who was the responsible pilot above the first Cataract. The men were overboard in a few moments, and the usual scene ensued — a great deal of shouting, an immense deal of swearing (for Mussulmen swear like troopers, though travelers are given to calling their nu- merous exclamations very devout, which consist of com- pounds of the name of God), and a little lifting— at length she floated, and all were silent again, and I gathered my cloak around me and sank quietly to sleep.

I think that while this memory flashed before me I fell asleep on the logs. I awoke with a start, listened to the curious sounds of the night, then threw myself down by the Baron's side on the boughs under the bark shelter and slept with serenity.

Day had not fairly broken when I awoke and roused the Baron. We desired to try the early morning fishing ; and after a dash in the cold water and a cup of delicious

A TELEGRAM.

193

cafe noir, made in ten minutes on the camp-fire, we pushed off on the rafts and began casting.

There was a low fog on the lake, and so long as this continued there was little hope for a rise. I have gener- ally found in our northern waters that trout will not rise in fog. Once in a while the rule fails, but not often. As soon, however, as a light breeze came up from the south and lifted the fog, the trout came out for their breakfasts, and we began to have fine sport. But we could find very few large fish. Only two or three rose which weighed over a pound. I struck one much larger fish, but lost him.

We cast for an hour, took some thirty or forty fair- sized trout, then went ashore for breakfast. While we were discussing a broiled chicken we heard a shout in the woods at the upper end of the lake, and in a few mo- ments saw Dupont emerging from the forest. He had left the hotel at sunrise and come over the mountain, bringing with him a package of letters and telegrams, to which we made the necessary replies, sending them down by a messenger. With all respect to the spirit of the nineteenth century, let an angler be permitted to record his detestation of the telegraph. One can't go now to a mountain lake, in the heart of the primeval forest, with- out being stirred up by sparks of intelligent electricity. There is no longer any such thing as kief in this or any part of the world. Do you know that word kief? Do you know kief? Go to Araby the Blessed and learn it; in the land where they always salute you with the prayer "Peace be with you." Still the telegraph may serve an angler's turn now and then. Some years ago, St. Anton

and C (old anglers of our Profile House company)

were dining with me at Geneva, in Switzerland, and after

N

194 I GO A -FISHING.

dinner, about ten o'clock, we said, " Let's drink Dupont's health;" and we sent him a telegram to the Profile House in two words, " Your health," and he received it at eight o'clock the same evening. So Alp spoke to White Mountain.

Nevertheless, as an angler I wish the magnetic tele- graph were among the lost arts. Why should we be an- noyed on the top of a mountain, by the shore of a beau- tiful lake, with the voices of the city ?

Dupont came into camp, and began to criticise the un- finished breakfast. He abused the burned chicken, as he called it, and ate a wing and a leg and a breast — all that was left of it. He found fault with the coffee, but drank it by the cupful. The trout he declined, for they were cold, but he tasted three or four.

We passed the day on the lake; but we had poor suc- cess. It was about the hottest day of the hot summer of 1872, and although we were some thousands of feet above the sea-level, we felt the oppression of the heat, and the trout in the cool depths knew that it was warm above, and would not come up.

We were therefore content to fill an eighteen-pound basket with small fish — only a few reaching a pound — and as the sun was setting the Baron came in from his sketching, and we started for home.

The descent of the mountain is easy if you keep the right track, but difficult and dangerous if you lose it. We have learned the route pretty well, yet are apt oc- casionally to miss it, and once found ourselves just at dark on the verge of a precipitous descent of three or four hundred feet, down which we effected an almost mi- raculous passage in safety.

Now, however, we came down without adventure, and

AN ARRIVAL. 1 95

emerged from the forest on the valley road just as the last rays of twilight were vanishing.

The horses knew that they were going home. We passed Profile Lake on a rattling trot, and when we rose the slight ascent coming out of the woods in front of the Profile House, the sight of the hundred gleaming win- dows cheered them as it cheered us, and they broke into a run and dashed up to the door in superb style. My legs were a little stiff, so that I staggered as I descended to the piazza, and might possibly have fallen but for the clasp of two strong arms which caught me, and a low, soft utterance of the musical salutation of the Orient :

"The salutation of peace, Effendi."

Involuntarily, before I saw his face, I responded " Be it peace," and, lo ! it was John Steenburger.

Fresh from the far-off lands of our affection, John had arrived in New York but two days before, and, finding some of our friends on the wing for the mountains, joined them, and was watching on the piazza for my return. How we embraced !

" Well, we are all here," said John.

" What ? Who is with you ?"

"All the family. Lucy and George and the young ones, Philip and the Doctor; all in your rooms at this moment."

And there they were — the birch-wood blazing high on

my hearth, the children asleep on the diwan, Mrs. L

and her husband sitting before the fire, while Philip and the Doctor were furiously discussing some comic fishing sketches of John Leech, which were the chief ornaments on the walls.

" You never wrote that you were coming. Serves you right to find the house full and no rooms for you."

196 I GO A- FISHING.

" I'm sure we have very comfortable quarters here," said George, surveying my cosy salon with cool satisfac- tion j " nothing to complain of — wish I might always fall as fair on my feet."

" Precisely, my boy. But you won't feel as well when you and Lucy and the two youngsters are crowded into that next room, as you will be to-night ; for the rest of us must manage with these diwans and the floor. We'll do something better to-morrow, and you have all of you seen worse quarters. Have you people dined 1 Yes, of course. Half starved when you arrived. Supper they call it here, but I make it dinner. I must go and dress and get some- thing to eat. How bright the lonesome room looks ! John, go down and help me drink a bottle of Turken- blud."

It was not strange that all our talk that evening was of the East and our old friends there, for John Steenburger was a late arrival, and having passed three or four years, at different dates, in Egypt and Syria and Asia Minor, knew all the people that we knew, and could give us late intelligence from them. I had missed him the last time I was in the East ; and he had seen Cairo and crossed the desert only a few months before his arrival. We yielded to the spell of the Orient. John Steenburger had brought it with him, and who could escape it ? He was but thirty days from Damascus. The very cigarette he rolled as he talked was of tobacco from the mart of Latakia, where he bought it, and the paper was some which he had picked up in a shop at Athens the day he rested there on his way across the isthmus to Corfu, and so up to Trieste.

" No one of us has heard from you in months. Your letters must have gone astray. How came you to cross the desert again V

EASTERN TALK. I97

" It was a sudden notion. I was sitting in my room at Zech's in Cairo, that little room that opens on the front by the door, when I overheard a conversation which in- terested me somewhat. I was lonesome just then, and withal I did not know where to go next. It was there- fore pleasant to hear familiar voices talking of going somewhere. It turned out that the talkers were Ameri- can travelers. Some of them knew people that were friends of ours. I joined them, and they persuaded me to cross the desert. They went to Sinai. I left Cairo a week later, crossed to Akabah, and waited for them there, and so we went together to Petra, and thence by Hebron to Jerusalem. Afterward I was possessed with the idea of doing Asia Minor, at least so far as seeing th-e cities of the seven churches, and we did that too."

" Poor John !"

"May I venture to ask the meaning of that tone of voice ?"

"What a lonesome life you have been leading, John. When we parted in Switzerland I felt as if I should never see you again. You have such a strange way of wander- ing off alone. You have seen a great deal of the world, but never, since we left you, have had any one to enjoy travel with you."

"Company I never lacked. There was Laroche, the best Frenchman I ever knew ; Strong, whose good heart I wrote you about when I was sick in Aleppo; and Hall, the Englishman who did me a good turn one night in Da- mascus, when it might have gone hard with me but for him."

" But you did not love one of them. I know that. The truth is, John, that travel, to be thoroughly enjoyed, must be with familiar and, more than familiar, affectionate com-

198 I GO A-FISHING.

pany. Travel in the older countries warms and opens the heart. Do you remember that moonlight at Bethel, when every rock was like a tent, and there were Jacob's ladders reaching up to the sky on every side of us ? Do you not remember how it made all our hearts as soft as the hearts of young children? It was always so with me in the East. Strangers could not be happy together in such travel. You must have longed every moment for one or two or more companions to whom you could talk out all you felt. How many times I have seen you lie down on the ground, face up to the evening sky, back pressed on the turf, as if you were growing fast to it, and then pouring out your rhapsodies. You will never travel so joyously and freely again, unless we all go together."

" Alas, dear Madam, that can never be in this world," said John, and we were all silent for a little. Then he added : " I think you are more than half right — I know you are altogether right. Eastern travel is different, in that respect, from all other. The drafts made on the thinking faculties are enormous. And not alone on the thinking faculties, but especially on the believing facul- ties. Sometimes I think faith is as distinct a faculty as memory. I am sure it is as distinct as conscience, for conscience is in reality but the judgment on comparison with a standard, and faith is much the same mental act, with the exception that it seems sometimes instinctive, or say inspired. All over the Eastern world every step brings some new object for faith, and faith yields or refuses to yield by an involuntary process. It is quick — swift as lightning sometimes, and it is the special happiness of travel, where the mind is thus occupied, to have compan- ions to whom one may talk freely of the objects and ef- fects of faith, seen and unseen as well. It would be little

STEENBURGERS STORY. I99

pleasure to me to travel in the East without company, such as I want in this room when I talk out my inmost thoughts. I have heard men say that they liked to be alone among old ruins, that they found invisible company, and took delight in it. I went out to try it at Karnak one night, alone. It was an Egyptian night, with a moon almost full. The ruins were peopled with ghosts and phantoms by the cross-lights in the great hall of columns. I sat an hour in the grand aisle, then climbed to the top of the old north wall, and looked over the waste of splen- dor, all white and pure in that light. But as for enjoying it, it was the most absolutely miserable evening of years of travel, unless I except just such a night at Palmyra. It was full of restless, uncomfortable, tumultuous thinking. No one to speak to, and a tempest of thinking all the time, which I suppose you might call involuntary think- ing, with no one to think to."

" I heard from Cairo that you had a row of some kind near Wady Mousa. What was it all about? Who had charge of your caravan ? Barikhat or Houssein or Sheik Achmed ?"

"Achmed, of course. I wrote you all about that from Jerusalem."

"Your letter never came."

" Strange ; what can have become of all my letters ? And you don't know that Achmed is dead ?"

"Achmed? No. I saw him in 1870, and I thought if any man would live a century it was Achmed Ben Houssein."

" Cold lead is bad for all constitutions alike."

"Shot?"

" Yes, poor fellow, shot. He was the best man I ever found among Bedouins. I always thought much of Ach-

200 I GO A-FISHING.

med. He was above the average of Arabs in intellectual ability, for he did a good deal of independent thinking on his own account. You told me the same thing of him once yourself, and I remember that you said he was the only Bedouin you ever knew who had any religion which could be called a part of him. It was true. He often asked questions which were really quite surprising as in- dications of the extent to which his reflections had carried him. I always talked religion with him. During my last journey as well as this we talked a great deal about Mohammed and about the Christian faith. More I think this time than before.

" In the evenings, when the camp was pitched, the scene around us was always exceedingly impressive. At such times our Arabs gathered in a group close to the tent in which our dinner-table was set, and listened, wondering, to the fire of talk which we carried on in English or in French, until the coffee came on, and our pipes were alight. Then, in the fragrant air, we turned to our swarthy followers, who lay on the sand outside, and one or another would recount a story of the old times, a crusade legend, or a history of love and war, which I would repeat to the sons of the desert. You know how the love of story-list- ening is one of the remarkable traits of Bedouin charac- ter. But it is no common story that tickles their literary palates. It must be garnished with abundance of rhetor- ical figure, loaded with imagery, and sonorous with words. Therefore more depends on the interpreter than on the relater in such a case.

"The Bible furnished material for many of these tales; and the stories of the patriarchs given in the Jewish ver- sion of them differ so entirely from the Mohammedan ver- sion, that they had to the listeners the freshness of new

THE BEDOUIN. 201

relations. Sheik Achmed would lie on the sand for hours listening to Hall's relation of the events in the life of Joseph; and I could see his keen eye light with the story at its salient points, and show his full appreciation of it.

" ' I'll try Achmed this evening on a story out of the New Testament/ said Hall one day as he rode by my side ; and in the evening, when the stars were looking down on us in a deep gorge between two lofty rocks, Stephen told the story of the Fall of Man and the Passion of the Son of God. I translated it, watching Achmed's eyes.

" It was a weird scene, that group of Bedouin listeners, with flashing eyes hearing the history of the king of a far country, who ransomed his subjects at such cost. They understood the story well. Every point told on their keen intellects, and they exchanged glances of intelligence at every new passage.

" The next morning, as we were riding slowly up a val- ley toward the northeast, Achmed closed up by my side, and began a conversation.

"'The story that Howadji Stephano told last night — '

"'Yes, Sheik Achmed.'

" ' You think it a true story as well as the Howadji Ste- phano.'

" ' I ? How know you that I think it true ?'

" ' By your eye and voice. Besides, I have heard it be- fore.'

" ' Where, and when ?'

" ' You told me part of it once, that night we were out- side the Deir San Saba ; and then I heard it again from Father Paul, at the convent at Jebel Mousa. He told it to me one evening when he was shut out, for he had been to see a sick man in the tents of the Oulad-Said. He

202 I GO A- FISHING.

found the convent closed, and he slept that night in my tent. He was a good man, and he believed the story. I wish I knew more about Isa, the son of Mary.'

" Our conversation was interrupted by the sudden ap- pearance, on a hill commanding our route, of a party of Bedouins, whom Achmed recognized on the instant as some of those scoundrels that inhabit the southern parts of Moab, but who fled as we advanced. One of their number, however, stood for a long time defiantly on the brow of the hill, and the sheik, lifting his mare to her full speed, crossed the valley, and commenced the ascent of the rocky hill on which his foe stood. The latter coolly swung his gun from his shoulder, and covered his ap- proaching enemy. In vain we shouted to Achmed. In vain we sent a volley of balls from our revolvers, which carried not half way to the hill. A puff of smoke against the blue sky, a rattling echo down the ravine, and Achmed reeled in his saddle.

" It was all over in an instant. The enemy vanished as if in the smoke of his gun, and our leader lay on the rocky hill-side, his faithful mare standing over him. We were at his side in a few moments. He was badly wounded, but already endeavoring to stanch the fast-flowing blood. Lifting him carefully from his bad position among the rocks, we carried him down to the sandy plain, and laid him on his own soil, the earth to which, I had no doubt from the first, he must now return.

" There was no good material with which to form it, but Achmed insisted that a rude camel's litter should be made, and with the aid of some of the baggage a sort of half hammock half Taktarawan was constructed, in which for four hours of the day he swung in great pain, and yet, with the firmness of a Roman, determined that he would

WADY MOUSA. 203

bear all to reach Wady Mousa and the Rock City before he should die.

" When the evening came on we were still six hours from the valley of Petra. But it was agreed on all hands that the sheik's wishes should be strictly observed even at any sacrifice, and we rested only half an hour to eat and let the camels rest, then pushed on in the twilight. The moon rose and shone on our strange procession, and by her light we reached at length the narrow entrance of the valley. We had sent messengers in advance, and our coming was expected. A swarthy group were waiting for us at the door of a chamber in the rock, which had once been, perhaps, the hall of a palace, or mayhap the tomb of a prince; for it is difficult to say what was tomb or what was habitation of the living in this city of the ancient mighty. Houssein, the father of the wounded sheik, with the old men of his tribe, were gathered here to await our arrival, and received us in silence but with perfect cordi- ality, and gave us the w^ords of welcome so seldom pro- nounced to strangers in Wady Mousa.

" Lifting the wounded man into the place prepared for him, and making him as comfortable as the circumstances of the case would permit, we sat down around him, rest- ing on our baggage here and there, to await the change which we knew was fast coming over the Bedouin.

'^ Have I said that Hall, the Englishman, was a surgeon in the navy ? He had pronounced the sheik's wound in- curable from the beginning, and now said that he had but a few hours to live.

" As the gray dawn began to course up the eastern sky he was manifestly dying. His dark countenance, thin and hollow-faced at the best, was now almost spiritual in appearance. You who remember him will not think it

204 I GO A -FISHING.

Strange that I apply to a Bedouin this phrase, which is more frequently applicable to the dying features of Chris- tian girls in Western homes.

" His countenance was noble always. There is a head of Christ, by Titian, in the Pitti Gallery at Florence, which mayhap you have seen. The features are delicately out- lined ; the coloring not Titianesque at all, but rather un- certain and undecided. The face of Achmed reminded me of that picture when I met him first, and on this morn- ing it was unearthly in its serene splendor.

"One might have thought him his father Ishmael, dying on the desert that was his sole inheritance. No trap- pings of royalty were around him, such as surround the couches of princes of more wealthy lands. The lands of this Duke of Edom were the barren desert, stretching away in its wastes of rock and sand. His palace was the ruined palace of a Roman governor, down through the shattered front of which the blue sky reflected the light of the coming day before the sun came up to shine in Wady Mousa. The poor burnoose — the rough cam- el's-hair cloak that inswathed his form — was the substi- tute for the purple of a kingly death-bed ; but more ma- jestic countenance never shone on living men than was his as the dawn lit its thin features, and his father bent over him to say that he was dying.

" I know not what thoughts had possession of his mind, or whether his countenance were indeed a fair indication of his soul ; for his words were simple enough, but sub- lime enough withal to express a consciousness of his no- ble origin, and the splendor of his exit from the land of his fathers on a sunny morning in the valley of Petra.

The Hakim saith you are not to live longer, my son Achmed.'

ACHMED BEN HOUSSEIN. 205

" ' It is well. The will of God and his prophets be obeyed.'

" ' What shall I do for you before you depart ? for it is written, " Let him order his affairs before he die, lest his children have trouble in their tents." '

" ' I have no children to be troubled, and nothing to cause them trouble if I had. I give Houssein my spear, and Khalifa my gun. The mare is yours, O my father ! She will bear you well until you and I are together again. Howadji, you are going to El-Khuds. I would have gone with you to the Holy City myself, but since I can not, here is my shawl; there is in the folds of it a sum of money, and the shawl itself is worth ten thousand pias- tres. Take the money to the priests that guard the tomb of Isa Ben Mariam, and give the shawl to Mohammed Dhunnouf, sheik of the Mesjid el-Aksa. Do this for me, oh Howadji Yeyeh, and add to the money you give the priests so much as you owe me for this journey, making it as large an amount as your love for me will warrant. I trust you fully, for you have been kind.'

" ' Why divide the money and the cashmere, Sheik Ach- med ? Were it not better to give both to the sheik of the Dome of the Rock ?'

" ' Not so. We Bedouins have little knowledge of re- ligion, though we call our faith the faith of Islam. But I know not whether, after all, there may not be some error in all this, and some truth in your faith in Isa, the son of Mary. My possessions are small. I am of the Beni-Is- mahil ; but our father had no lands other than the desert, and we had nothing from his father Ibrahim. That which I have is the gift of God. I would give it back to him directly. I know no better way than this. Deny me not, O Effendi !'

206 I GO A- FISHING.

" ' Nay, nay, Sheik Achmed ; I will do as you wish.'

" * It is well. I am content'

" The conversation had wearied him. The eyes which had been fixed with imploring gaze on mine closed for a few moments. The older sheik was silent, and now several of the tribe came to the door, and looking in, asked if he were yet at peace. All their questions were put in the poetic language of the desert. It was remark- able that no man asked in simple words, ' Is he better ?' or ' Is he worse ?' but every one inquired in metaphoric phrases, the most frequent of which was that touching in- quiry, ' Is it peace ?'

" No shudder or convulsion marked the instant when Achmed Ben Houssein passed into the presence of Ish- mael his ancestor. The sun came up over the eastern hill, and the soft light fell on the front of the ruin in which he lay, and a single beam of light coming through the door-way at the side of the curtain touched his counte- nance. That mild touch awoke him.

" He had known the sunshine on his countenance bet- ter than we know it in cold western countries. He and the sunshine were old friends, and the morning light on his forehead was like the familiar caress of a mother.

" He raised his heavy eyelids and met the gaze of the old man who stood over him, looking intently on his face, and a smile, I verily believe the first smile that had cross- ed his countenance in years, took complete possession of it as he murmured, ' La Illah il Allah ' (There is no de- ity but God); and then he hesitated, and the smile be- came almost a laugh of delight as he added, ' Isa Ben Mariam rasoul Allah !' (Jesus the son of Mary is the messenger of God !)

" Sheik Houssein did not indicate, by look or sign, that

DEATH OF ACHMED. 207

he approved or disapproved the creed in which his son was dying, thus announced in his last breath. Achmed gazed into his father's eyes longingly and steadfastly, as if seeking some approval or dissent; but finding neither, the smile on his countenance changed to a look of anxi- ety, even of pain, and then he stretched his tall form on the floor, and without sigh or moan or utterance of any kind the son of the desert was dust like the old dust around him.

"In the afternoon the Alaween dug a grave for their dead brother in the burial-place of his people, and, wrap- ping around him the clothes in which he died, they car- ried him out to burial. The procession was not large. The women rent the air with their occasional shrill cries, but this was only formality. He had left no wife or chil- dren, and his father was too old to mourn for such events. Seven tall sons had he buried like this one, and the eighth grave was filled up in the afternoon sunlight."

The night was far advanced before we were tired of talking. By midnight the hotel had sunk into a profound silence, though more than seven hundred persons were sleeping in it and the surrounding buildings. We should have talked the night through if the Doctor had not in- terrupted us with a stentorian snore. So we made our camp on the floor and the diwans, and the morning sun, coming over Eagle Cliff, caught us there.

XL

ON A MOUNTAIN BROOK.

The Pemigewasset flows out from Profile Lake, a swift brook, receiving at almost every fifty rods the water of a greater or less cold spring, and by the time it crosses the Plymouth Road, five miles down the valley, is a strong stream. In traveling this distance it descends several hundred feet, and the entire course is in dense forest, ex- cept a few rods of open country at the Lafayette clearing. Its water is of that pure transparency which characterizes a few of our American mountain brooks. You can see the bottom at ten feet depth about as clearly as if look- ing through air.

After crossing the road it lapses along over a pebbly bottom for a fourth of a mile, and then plunges into a deep rocky ravine, cascade after cascade, falling some three or four hundred feet in less than two hundred rods, until it reaches "the Pool." Deep holes abound among the rocks all along the course. But it is of no use to try fly-fishing on this river, for, in the first place, there is no chance for a cast, and, in the second place, the trout will not rise to a fly at any season of the year. Perhaps this is due to the marvelous clearness of the water, but I will not undertake to assign a reason.

Many visitors at the Profile House have fished the river down to the bridge. Few have attempted to go through

THE PEMIGEWASSET. 209

the wild gorge below. Dupont and myself have often done it, but never with so great difficulty as in the sum- mer of 1872, when, in consequence of the continuous rain, the river was very high and strong.

" Will you fish a brook to-morrow ?" I said to Dupont as we were parting at midnight.

"What brook do you want to fish?"

"The Pemigewasset, below the bridge."

" Can we get through with the water as high as now ?"

" We can try."

And so we met at an early breakfast, and were off down the valley with Jack and the buck-board before the sun was up. The sound of the water in the Basin was thun- derous. I confess that I began to think of backing out, but I said nothing. At the Basin we put on our wading trousers and went in.

It was a clear, cool day, with a soft breeze shaking the birch-leaves and cooling our heads, which would other- wise have been very hot while our feet were in the cold water. For the temperature of the Pemigewasset is sel- dom above forty-five.

For me there is always more pleasure to be derived from fishing a brook than from any other angling. Flow- ing water is always attractive, and every rod of this river is exquisitely beautiful.

The piscatorial dilettante is fond of condemning bait- fishing as a low business. I differ from him. It is a fine art, and in all the classics of our art-history has taken high rank. If the test be found in the amount of skill re- quired for its practice, then without dispute it ranks as high as fly-fishing, I grant freely that sitting in a boat or on a lake-shore and fishing for trout with a deep line and a float is not one of the fine arts. Any one can do

O

2IO I GO A -FISHING.

it. But I know very few men who can fish a brook with bait as it should be done. I could do it better myself forty years ago than now, for the boy along the brook learns a thousand lessons that he forgets as he grows older.

There is little choice of bait, but there is something in even that. Never give up a deep hole in which you have reason to think there are good trout until you have exhausted your resources. The angle-worm is your main reliance, but if that does not take, try the tail of a small trout, or a bright-colored fin, or, if you can find it, a red- fin's tail or fin. These last we do not find in the Pemige- wasset, where trout and only trout inhabit. Sometimes nothing is so taking as a grasshopper, at another time the eye of a trout, and often the red gill will attract large fish.

But the best of bait will be of no avail if you do not fish with care and skill. Trout will seldom take bait when they see you, or if they do, it will be with a sudden dash out from under a bank or log or rock, and as sudden a rush back. Then the chances are in favor of your losing trout and hook, for the fish have a marvelous aptitude for winding a line around twigs and roots and stakes.

In most brooks the fish are found in deep holes, at the foot of a fall or a rapid, under a bank, or under over- hanging rocks. But in others they will be lying in the lower end of each deep pool where it shoals up to the out- flow. In swift rapids they lie in small eddies, watching for what comes down stream. Their eye-sight is marvel- ously keen. And it must be borne in mind that however rough the surface of clear water may be, the water itself below the surface is a solid medium like glass, so that a fish under water sees in all directions as we do in the air when the wand blows. I have seen a trout start from a

THE BASIN. 211

point forty feet distant for a bait thrown into the Pemige- wasset and take it, and I was so much surprised that I measured the distance.

With either fly or bait I prefer to fish a stream down- ward. This is contrary to many authorities, but is the result of my own experience. I make no account of the fact that fish lie with their heads up stream. They have no eyes in their tails, but they see backward with sharp vision. The dash and foam of the waterfall hides the angler effectually from the fish as he comes down stream to a pool, and rougher water is usually found in the upper part of every good trout -hole. Fish lying under the rough surface see out plainly enough down stream, through the glassy water and the smooth surface at the lower end of the pool. Where the fall is strong and the foam abundant, you may come down to the very edge of the pool from above, and take trout from within three feet of your stand.

It seems, too, that trout are less likely to be frightened by an angler wading the brook than by one on the bank. Why this is I leave for others to explain, but I have known many a trout to rise between my very feet at a fly trailing from my hand while I stood in the middle of a rapid.

All visitors at the Profile House know the Basin, a great hollow in the granite rock, around which for some thousands of years the river has swept boulders until they have worn this mighty bowl, now holding some fifteen feet of transparent water, into which the river descends in a cataract, and from which it rushes out through a cleft in the granite and plunges into a pool below. I never took a trout in the Basin. It is a singular illustration of a habit of trout, which I think is well confirmed, namely, that they will not lie in a hole, however inviting, between

2 12 I GO A -FISHING.

two cascades. Trout do not ascend perpendicular falls of any great height, nor do they descend them of their own free will. They are timid fish, and desire a clear run in case of danger, and it is probably this prevision and provision for flight which leads them to be shy of all pools which lie between cascades.

We fished the river a few rods down from the Basin, then crossed the woods fifty or a hundred rods to the Cascade brook, which runs into the Pemigewasset a half- mile below. This is one of the finest brooks in America for scenery, as well as for small trout. It comes down a thousand feet in the course of a mile or two, and its last descent is over a smooth broad face of granite, a hundred feet wide, and sloping steeply two or three hundred feet. Along this slide the brook sometimes wanders hither and thither, from side to side, as if hesitating to hurry down ; but in high water it is a broad and mighty torrent, white as snow, roaring and dashing itself in great masses of foam high in the air, and covering all the slope from for- est to forest.

We found the stream lower in comparison than the Pemigewasset, and commencing at the foot of the slope we fished it down to the junction. The supply of trout in all these streams is something wonderful. It never mat- ters whether we fish side by side or follow one another. After one has apparently exhausted a pool, the other com- ing a little after will find it well stocked with fish, who had taken refuge under rocks while the first was there, or who have rushed up to it as he passed down stream.

We had a short dispute as to the proprietorship of a small trout. We threw into a pool together, standing on opposite sides of it, and as we lifted out each his trout there was but one between us, swinging in mid-air over

WINE FOR LUNCHEON. 213

the pool on both rods. The quick fellow had taken both hooks before his companions could get hold of either. He had companions, for we took a half-dozen out of the same pool.

Our favorite luncheon-place is on a large rock at the junction of the Cascade brook with the Pemigewasset. Here is a deep pool under the rock, a dense overhanging shade, and across the Pemigewasset close by the edge of the river runs the road, yet shut from view of it by thick brush. Many a day we have sat on that rock and seen the wagons go by with loads of visitors from the hotel to the Flume, and have recognized through the openings in the trees familiar faces from the city, faces of friends who would hardly have recognized us had they seen us in fish- ing costume.

We reached the rock at two o'clock or thereabouts, and after taking ten or a dozen trout from the pool, sat down in the shade, or rather stretched ourselves on the rock. A bottle of the red blood of the Beaune grapes was lying in the sunshine while we had been fishing the pool, and when we had rested a half-hour or so was in perfect con- dition. This, with a sandwich, made our luncheon. I have yet to meet with the angler of experience who uses strong drinks while fishing. It is especially bad for one who is wading a cold brook to carry and use whisky or brandy. The tendency of blood to the head, caused by cold at the lower extremities, is enough without the help of alcohol in condensed form. Dupont and myself have fished together more or less for many years, and after some experience we have agreed on a light Burgundy as the best wine for luncheon in the woods. So the bottle occupies a place in one of the baskets, and its room is wanted at just about the time we want the wine.

214 I C^O A- FISHING.

" Effendi," said Dupont, as he laid down the last frag- ment of a sandwich which he could not master, and then stretched himself on the rock and lighted a cigar, " did you ever make any estimate of the amount of time that you have passed in this business of 'going a-fishing?' "

" What, all told ?"

"Yes, all told and added up."

"No, never; but I fancy it would add up some years."

" So much ?"

" Yes, we are often astonished when we count up time which we have spent without keeping the record. It slips away more easily than money, and the sum total of ex- penditure will sometimes startle, and may well alarm us unless we have something to show for it. You sleep somewhat more than six hours a day, but suppose it to be only six ; that is, one fourth of twenty-four hours. If you live to be eighty years old, you will have passed twenty years of your life in a state of unconsciousness. Your breakfast, luncheon, dinner, and coffee occupy you, or should occupy you at least two hours each day, so that at eighty you will have spent more than six years in feed- ing. I know gentlemen who ride daily to and from their places of business in railway cars, passing two or three hours of the day in this transit, who would be surprised if it were brought to their notice that they pass one month or more each year, or one whole year in every twelve, in- side of a railway carriage."

" And men waste life in this fearful way ?"

" It is the order of nature, and the result of our modern systems of life and labor. The sleep is no waste of time. The Creator intended it to be so ; but it is well for men, in looking at life, to think that short as it is the working hours are vastly shorter, and that one fourth is always to

SLEEP. 215

be deducted from any apparent view of a period devoted to life or labor or love. Sometimes that brevity of time for love is an overwhelming thought. We look forward to a dear companionship of years. We give to that com- panionship how much? I know many a man who loves his family with devoted affection, but who gives ten hours each day to business, and six to sleep, and thus can count in every twenty years only seven which he has passed in their society. I do not find fault with him to whom labor is a necessity, but it is beyond question a wrong to him- self and others in the case of one who has no actual need to keep on working ; and surely it is a grand error in the modern social structure that the styles of life, the require- ments of social position, the luxuries that have become necessities of our artificial life, compel this vast sacrifice of the affections. It is more than a sacrifice of affection, for it has its effect on the character, and so on the nations and the age. But what's the use of talking about it. We can't reform it. Only, my boy, it's pleasant, lying on this rock and watching the water, to think that when the rough and tumble is over — when we have had our play in the forests, and have done our work in the factories — when we have gotten through the alternations of sunshine and shade, light and darkness, labor and rest, there will be an end of it, where there will be no more sleeping."

"What ! no sleep in heaven ? I'm not so sure of that. Sleep is one of the blessings. You know, ' He giveth his beloved sleep.' "

" A beautiful passage, and one that it seems very hard to erase from our Bibles : but, you know, it does not be- long there. The correct translation of the Hebrew is, ' He giveth to his beloved asleep.' God's gifts are often unsought, unforeseen, and come without our seeking or

2l6 I GO A-FISHING.

working for them. ' Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain. It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows. He giveth to his beloved while they sleep.' No, sir, there is no night and no sleep there, and no need of sleep, for the eternal joys are not to be weari- some."

" But you don't believe that we are to lead a life of eternal repose there. I can't say that I have any fancy for the heaven that some people look to, of everlasting quiet and calm and rest. Is labor then necessarily pain that men think it a blessing to get rid of it ?"

" For them that labor and are heavy laden, there is rest there ; but I agree with you in believing that the rest is only refreshment for eternal work and the enjoyment of it. The keenest sense of happiness which man has here, is found in doing something for the objects of his affec- tion. The most perfect contentment is to be found in being useful. I often wonder what ideas Augustine had. He used a word once which made me fancy that with all his eloquent thought about heaven, of which his works are so full, he never quite appreciated it."

" The word ?"

" He said ' Ibi vacabimus' — I don't like that word vaca- himus — ' Ibi vacabimus et videbimus, videbimus et amabi- mus, amabimus et laudabimus. Ecce quod erit in fine sine fine.' I remember the passage because I often say if over to myself, and it closes his greatest work, *De Civitate Dei.' But I don't believe the life hereafter will be any such as is properly expressed by that word vacabiinus. Old friend, I was taught from childhood to believe in a local heaven. We shall be there with these eyes of ours.

SMALL TROUT. 2I7

I never see this glorious river rushing by us, pure and clear and strong, but I think — I think — how many hours I have sat here thinking 'Are there no rocks in the streams that flow in the celestial fields? Is the river that runs clear as crystal always a calm smooth stream, or does it not sometimes leap and flash in the holy light and add its voice to the grand harmonies?' No, no, it can't be there a long calm, a never-ending uniformity of existence. Oh for a breath of the winds that toss the hair and fan the cheeks of the white-robed ! Oh for a drop of the spray from the crystal stream ! Oh for an hour among those hills where the winds blow in tempests of joy, where cataract answers to cataract in riotous music. But the day is hurrying along. Let us start."

So we went down stream.

" Isn't it a glorious afternoon ? Throw down yonder. I saw the wave of a fin in the eddy under that rock — good — a half-pounder, the best fish to-day."

"Yes, and the best this season in the Pemigewasset. I believe the trout in this brook never would grow large. Can they be a small variety, a species that do not exceed a quarter of a pound except in rare instances of mon- sters ?"

My friend's idea was one that I have often had. I have fished this river for a great many years, and I never took but one trout weighing a pound in it, and he was probably a wanderer from the lake. It is just possible, however, that all the large fish go up into Profile Lake, and all the small fish come down into the brook. The Cascade brook, however, is different. Here at the junction we often take such fish as that half-pounder, and as we go up we find the run of trout much larger than in the Pem- i2:ewasset, until we come to the Moran Lake brook. In

2l8 I GO A-FISHING.

that we have good fish, and the lake is crowded with large and small fish. We have killed a great many pound and some two-pound fish in it, and we see thousands of small fry.

"Isn't that a beauty?"

I was lifting out a small Pemigewasset trout. Of all fish in the world I think they are the most beautiful. They look like translucent fish, or as if there was a light in them shining out through a pearl skin, which has a soft, peachy, flesh tint, with spots of gold and red standing out of it. The clearness of their tints is due to the purity of the water. The color of a trout depends on the water he is in, and on the position of his latest repose. Lying in the dark he becomes dark, and lying in sunshine he loses all his dark tints. The change is effected in a brief time. An hour or two will suffice to change a black trout into a bright light color, and vice versa. A dead trout. bleaches rapidly. If you place your trout at night in a flowing stream of water, you will find in the morning that all the dark color in the skin is gone. If a trout just killed is allowed to lie on the bottom of a boat or on a wet board, he will change his color where the skin touches the board in fifteen minutes. The variation in tint is no indication of difference in species. In a pond in the northern Adi- rondack region, known as Bay Pond, the trout have a very singular characteristic. They are sprinkled with small black spots over all parts of the body, as if peppered for the table. These spots are in the skin under the scale, and would seem to be the result of disease. But the trout are vigorous and healthy, fine in flavor and firm in meat, and have the reputation of being very strong for their weight. This peculiarity is found on fish of all sizes, but I have never seen a trout of less than two years'

THE TORRENT. 219

age from this pond, and am unable to say at how early a time the spots appear.

We had resumed our rods, and were wading side by side down the river. From the junction of the Cascade brook the Pemigewasset flows in a rapid stream over rocks, without any deep holes, till it reaches the bridge. Few trout are to be found along this reach. Just above and just below the bridge we found plenty of small fish, and on this day we counted seventy from the still water below. Then we pushed on down stream to the gorge. The torrent had become fierce and strong, and the roar at the head of the first fall was so loud that we could not hear each other shout at ten paces' distance. Every plunge of the river now went into a deep pool, from which we took several fish, averaging about a quarter of a pound, with an occasional larger one. It was no longer possible to wade, except close along the edges, nor often there. At one spot we paused, where the stream nar- rowed between high rocks. On the right bank a smooth slope of rock fell into ten feet of rushing foam, the upper edge of the slope, skirted with brush, some twenty feet above the water. The left bank showed a ledge of rock down which one might go, if it were possible to cross. I tried the passage cautiously, step by step, careful to se- cure the position of one foot before I lifted the other. In mid-stream, with three feet of wild water sweeping around me, I looked back and saw Dupont working along the sloping rock, almost over my head, holding by the bushes, and swinging himself along hand over hand for twenty feet, until he reached a ledge below. How he held his rod I can not imagine. I crossed, and we did not speak to each other for a half-hour after that. The thunder of the river rose between us. When I rejoined him it was

220 I GO A-FISHING.

by a series of long leaps from rock to rock, on one of which my wet boots slipped, and I sat down, slid forward, and lost my momentum only on the edge of the stone. Six inches farther would have ended my fishing experi- ence, for the strongest swimmer would have had his brains dashed out in that wild fall of water. Again and again we climbed the rocks two hundred feet, to descend again within two rods of where we had left the stream. Perhaps this sounds like folly. The folly, if there were any, was in starting at all down the gorge. Once started, there is no turning back, for after the first few rods down that ravine the easiest way out is to go through.

We slipped side by side down a smooth rock, unable to stay the swift descent by any grasp of the fingers or pressure of the palms, and brought up, a mass of rods, baskets, and fishermen, in a heap of moss.

" When will you remember to leave that ring at home, instead of wearing it in such work as this .^" said Dupont.

I acknowledged the error, as I had several times be- fore, and transferred the ring from finger to pocket. " Ars est longa, vita brevis," said I, as I gathered myself and my traps together, and sat down to take breath in the comparative silence of the nook into which we had fallen.

" Apropos of what is that very trite remark ?"

" The ring. If, as some have supposed, the soul of the artist lingers around his beautiful work, what an odd scene Solon must think this. When he engraved that ring, I fancy he did not expect to follow it to this wild gorge. If he follows any of his work he follows this, for more perfect never left his hands. Cupid is living, breathing, struggling, as he reaches out his hands to catch and clasp the fluttering Psyche. What a perfect statue is the little fellow now that this sunshine lights the sard."

FISHING AND TALKING. 221

" Cupid and Psyche in the gorge of the Pemigewasset ! Push on, Effendi, and take a trout out of that pool."

" My dear fellow, what is out of place in these fishing days of ours? Have we not talked of every subject un- der and many above the skies along the bank of this river ? Don't you remember that day when we were sit- ting on the rock under the bridge, and Doctor was

with us ? He had worked hard at the trout, had taken fifty, and was drawing his hook artistically in the deep rapid : I thought he was intent on trout. Not he. He came down suddenly on me with a question about Bac- trian coins, of which I knew as much as I knew about the currency of the moon. He could not tell when I asked him what had suggested such a question in connection with trout-fishing ; but I fancy it was by a rapid series of thoughts. He thinks about as much in old languages as in English, and either an old Greek word for a rod or staff (l3aKrr)pia), or the sight of a frog, not uncommon, and the Greek parpaxog, had suggested Bactria, and off we start- ed on a numismatic discussion, which carried us from the Ionian shores all along the coasts of Greece, and even to Sicily and Italy."

Every man seems to find in the gentle art abundant suggestion and opportunity of thinking about his own special hobby, if he have one. I had the evidence of this that day. For ten minutes after we had started again down the ravine I was sitting again on a rock, looking at the lofty cliffs, and recognizing a resemblance in the scene to a wonderful engraving by Diirer, in many re- spects the finest illustration of thought ever put on paper in the form of a picture. Of course I mean " The Knight and Death." So I lost myself in a trot, "all alone by myself," on one of my hobbies, namely, the early history

222 I GO A-FISHING.

of illustration by pictures; and while I was cantering away on this, Dupont went wading and climbing, climb- ing and wading down stream, and when I came to my senses I had lost him, or he had lost me, which is much the same. He had actually passed me without seeing me or being seen, and I thought he must still be up stream. In fishing such water, anglers should keep near each other. An accident may well happen ; and a broken limb or a sprained ankle would be a serious business to one alone in that gorge, whence in such case he could only get out by sending for stout assistance. I sat a half- hour, then went a few rods down, and fortunately found Dupont's foot-print still wet on a flat rock. Then I pushed on, and a hundred yards below saw him sitting, where he had been waiting a half-hour for me. He had reached the Ultijna Thule of that day's sport, and as I was not there he knew he must have passed me.

Below us the stream plunged down the heaviest cata- ract in the gorge, and the rocks rose perpendicular a hun- dred feet on each side. The first time we went down there we were an hour in getting out. Back we could not go, for the last few rods had been by leaps downward from rock to rock, which we could not climb to return. At last we discovered a way out, and we have used it often since. Climbing a singular mass of rocks, covered with brush and, on its top, with some large trees, we found the trunk of a fallen tree reaching over a chasm some thirty feet deep and full twenty wide. The branches were nearly all gone, such as remained only serving to bother our feet as we walked across it, and then dug our finger-nails in the roughnesses of a sloping face of granite which came down from bushes fifty feet or so above. Up this we crawled on hands and knees, in fact flat on our faces once

A RIDE TO POLLARDS. 223

in a while, till we could grasp a bush, then up on our feet, and along the hill-top to the path which leads from the Flume House to the pool, and so up to the road where the good horse Jack with the buck-board was wait- ing for us.

A day's fishing like this gives us no large fish, and so many small ones that we seldom count them. We often have from four to five hundred trout in our baskets as the result of such a day on the Pemigewasset.

There is much to be found besides trout in the valley of the Pemigewasset, and he is not a thoroughly skilled angler who has failed to learn the pleasure of finding people and character and life in instructive forms as he goes along a brook.

The morning after our fishing the river was lowery and threatening. The clouds hung low and the mountain- tops were invisible. But with a conviction that the day would not after all be rainy, I determined to go down the valley and up the East Branch to Pollard's, to make some inquiries about the possibility and practicability of an ex- pedition up that valley and over the Willey Mountain to the Crawford Notch and Crawford House.

We did not get away till noon, and then found the roads in bad order from heavy rain in the night.

The clouds were lifting, but their aspect on the mount- ain-sides was full of solemn magnificence. Here and there they were lit with sunshine vainly seeking to burst through them, and where these lights occurred the white mists seemed full of life, moving in wild circles or hurry- ing back and forth as if in feeble fright at their approach- ing evanishment. Far down the valley, under the long line of sombre clouds, there was a break of blue in the distant sky, and from our high position we seemed to look

224 I GO A -FISHING.

down to it. The roar of the Pemigewasset all along the road for miles was like the sound of Niagara. For we had had heavy rains of late, and the rivers were swollen and strong. Mountain-top was bound to mountain-top by the great mass of cloud. We traveled under a vast arch of gloom.

Two miles below the Flume House are the first mill- dams on the river, and as trout will rise to a fly here and lower down the river, I pulled up to try a few casts under the first dam. The behavior of a trout-rod is sometimes inexplicable. I had with me this morning a heavy fly- rod, which in case of need I could use as a bait-rod. It was a good rod, had done excellent service, and I thought was trusty. I was casting only twenty feet of line, and at the third or fourth cast, snap went the second joint close at the ferrule. The occurrence is not uncommon, nor does it ordinarily require much time to repair such a dam- age, which is one of the least importance to which rods are liable. I kindled a small fire of drift-wood, extracted the ferrule from that of the butt, burned out the broken wood, replaced it on the second joint, and cast again. A small fish, not over four ounces, rose to the fly. I struck him as gently as if he were a butterfly, and snap went the tip, at half its length. There were extra tips in the rod- case in the wagon, and one was soon substituted, and again I began to cast. I took a half-dozen fish, and then, as I was trying to throw a fly very lightly through an opening in the falling sheet of water and on to the still water behind the sheet and under the dam, I threw two thirds of the rod away, as the butt broke with a long di- agonal split from the ferrule upward.

A writer on gaming recommends his pupils never to run against luck, but when they find it decidedly bad, to aban-

GEORGIANA FALLS. 225

don play for the time. It is sometimes a good rule for anglers, but for the reason that such occurrences, the successive breakings of a rod, or repeated snarls in one's line, or the recurring loss of heavy fish after hook- ing them, may almost always be charged to the condition of body or mind in which the angler is fishing. It is nine times out of ten his fault and not his misfortune. Don't abuse your rod when the blame belongs to your- self.

A plenty of silk thread, waxed with shoemaker's wax, is a part of the necessary outfit for a day's fishing. It should be in the pocket of every fly-book, and in every pocket of every suit of fishing clothes. It can't be too abundant. With a good knife and plenty of thread one can build a rod in the woods or repair any break. But I took the hint that my right arm must be out of order, and having spliced the butt I made no more attempts at cast- ing under the mill-dam.

Half a mile below, however, we crossed the Georgiana brook just above its junction with the Pemigewasset. This brook rises far back in the mountains in an elevated basin, where lie Bog Pond and Bog Eddy, famous for large trout and plenty, but of poor flavor. The Georgiana Falls were visited in old times by scenery hunters, reached only by a long walk up the mountain from the Flume House. They well repaid much toil. Of late years the path has been abandoned, and it is now many years since the falls have sunk into almost oblivion. But they plunge down the rocky w^all as yellow in their foam as ever, for this water is of a deep dark color, and from such water trout seldom come without the woody flavor.

I lingered but a few moments near the bridge, and took out a half-dozen small fish, all nearly black. Ten rods

P

226 I GO A-FISHING.

below, at the junction, in the clear water of the Pemige- wasset, I took two fair-sized fish, shining like silver tinged with peach blossoms. The difference of water makes all the difference of color.

Rejoining L in the wagon, we drove on, and about

two o'clock, well down the valley, in a lonesome place among the mountains, we pulled up in front of a small house, and asked if we could get there feed for horse and man. "For horse, yes; for man, go in and ask." We went in. It was an ancient house for these parts, and we found in it only one person — a representative of the ancient days. She was an old woman — that was evident — but cheery and happy in voice and action.

" Can you give us something to eat, Mrs.T ?"

"Well, that depends on what you want to have."

" How about bread and milk ?"

" I can give you plenty of that, and I've got some pork and beans in the oven."

" Good. We'll have the pork and beans first, and then the bread and milk."

So the old lady bustled about, and set a round table, and spread a clean cloth and put on it two plates and two bowls, and opened the oven and brought out a great pot of smoking beans and set before us, all the while chat- ting gently, very gently, and pleasantly and cheerily, al- beit her hands were sorely trembling with the feebleness of age.

" How long have you lived in this valley, Mrs. T ?"

" More than fifty years. How old do you think I am ?"

"I can't guess; but I know you have done your share of work, and it is time for you to rest."

" Yes, my folks think I'm too old to do much work. I'm eighty-seven years old."

EIGHTY-SEVEN YEARS. 227

There, my friend, is a subject for your thoughtful con- sideration. Eighty-seven years, as we poor mortals count years by the swing of the globe, and fifty of them in this narrow valley between two mountains! - Eighty - seven peaceful years ! Eighty-seven tempestuous years ! Which had they been ? It matters little whether they who travel this pilgrimage of life travel in lonesome valleys or in crowded city streets. Life every where is calm or stormy, as God gives it, and there are tempests that shake the soul of man or of woman in mountain recesses as fierce as the storms that sweep over us in the deserts that we call social life.

But I think sometimes that the memories of old age, such as hers must be, are greatly to be envied ; and, after I had paid for our dinner and we were driving along the wild road up the East Branch, I began to imagine what hers perhaps might be, and to contrast them with my own memories of a more brief, but doubtless, in most men's estimation, more eventful life.

Looking out of her windows in the evening she saw the sunlight shining on the mountain-top as he had shone for fifty years, and the same tall pine-tree on the summit had in all those years been the last purple beacon of each departing day. The mountains are not so high to her old eyes as they used to be, for heaven has come down nearer to her. It is a blessing of old age, when it does not seem so much that the weary pilgrimage is tending upward toward the land of rest, as that the blessed coun- try is somehow brought nearer, as if it had come down from God. For John, in his old age, saw the Holy City descending ; and many, like the aged watcher in Patmos, have learned to look upward and say, " Come, Lord," in- stead of saying, "Take me away." And most of all this

228 I GO A-FISHING.

is true of those who have outlived the beloved of old time ; for the gathering feet of the dear ones gone press down the very blue above us, and bring heaven very near. Down the valley a little way is the grave-yard in which she had laid a great many dear forms of affection, and had seen her stout sons cover them out of her sight with the valley earth. A great many I say, but we who live in crowds all our lives might think the number few. There are only eleven inhabitants in the township in which she lives. There are something more than twice eleven sleep- ers in the grave-yard, but she knew them all, every one of them — old as w^ell as young, and, standing by their graves, she could tell you the story of each one's life and sorrow or joy and death. We live among cemeteries where we hesitate to leave our dead, in cold and lonesome solitude, among strangers by the thousand. Here they who sleep near each other are all of them old friends, or the children of friends, and it is not so hard to leave the dear ones in such company.

The epochs in her life are all marked in the grave- yard. The great events to which her memory goes back with most profound regard are there registered. Nature around her was unchanged, unchanging. Sunshine and storm, indeed, alternated on the mountain-sides, but the very alternation had a sameness that was like the hills themselves. Only, from time to time, when God gave her sorrow, in floods like the spring floods of the Pemigewas- set, she bowed and was well-nigh overwhelmed, but the mountains were the same every morning though the storm had been fierce in the night, and so at length she grew to be like them, unchanged by flood or storm, only purified. What a little world this valley home has been for fifty years !

WOMEN IN HEAVEN. 229

Do not imagine, my friend, that the great trials of your life, the strifes and agonizings which you have gone through, are peculiar. In some sense they may be so, and every heart knows his own bitterness; but God on his white throne saw with the same infinite tenderness the anguish of the old woman in the Pemigewasset valley and the anguish of emperor or pope mourning for the be- loved dead; and there are thousands of just such homes, and in every home a sorrow, in every home a memory that comes with the twilight, and grows mighty in the dark night, and over every one, above mountain-top and cloud and storm, the everlasting pity of the Master.

But why dwell on sorrows when, as I told you, she was cheery and bright, and it was evident abundantly that she had no heavy load of memory to carry. Life had rippled along as the river rippled over its rocky bed, flashing in the light of the sun, glowing silver-bright under the moon, gleaming with reflected starlight. There had been dark days and days of flood, but after a little the current went gently on in its old channel, and made music for itself Why should she be sad ? Life is not so well worth living that the other life is not better, and that other has more abundant joy, even of the sort that we best love here. The hills of heaven shine with more serene glory than these hills of ours, and when she has lived in some valley of the holy land, long, long after these granite hills are crumbled and gone, she will not feel old, but ever young — forever young.

I once asked a learned Mohammedan in Egypt wheth- er he believed that women would go to heaven (for it is an error to think that houries are mere women), and what he thought of the Prophet's saying that there are no old women there. He replied, giving what is I believe the

230

GO A-FISHING.

orthodox creed of Islam, that women will be saved like men, and will all be made young again — except one wom- an. And her story is somewhat interesting. When Jo- seph was viceroy in Egypt he was riding out one day near Memphis, and an old woman seizing him by the knee demanded charity. He turned to look at her, and was so shocked at her appearance that he involuntarily exclaimed " How terribly homely you are."

" Then why don't you pray to your God, who answers all your prayers, and ask him to make me beautiful .?"

Whereupon Joseph lifted up his hands and prayed for her, and instantly beheld her, standing by him, young and lovely, so lovely that he loved her and made her his wife; and she grew old and died long after him, and went to heaven and is an old woman there, and the only old woman in heaven, for God makes all good women young again once, but only once, and she can never be made young again. An Egyptian village perpetu- ates in its name (Badrashain) the story of this wife of Joseph.

Eternal youth ! Why is it that we are all so fond of this idea of youth, and constantly in our dreams of eter- nal blessedness thinking of ourselves and our friends as there to be young ? The youth of heaven is not to be what we call youth here. There is freshness and purity in the young soul, but I fancy we think too much of the body and its vigor and beauty when we picture the joys of heaven. There is a greater beauty, a more stately and impressive and winning beauty, a certain beatitude some- times in extreme old age unknown to the most brilliant youth. Measuring time by our very insufficient stand- ards, we call eighty years old age, but the eternal youth of heaven is youth because eternity stretches forever be-

THE STREAM OF LIFE. 23I

fore it, and there is no period of maturity — much less of feeble age to which it looks forward.

Standing in front of the house in which the old lady had given us our simple meal, I could look up the valley ten miles to the very head, where I knew a spring of clear cold water poured out under a lofty rock. For fifty years she had looked up the valley daily, and as the years passed she must have thought often that the view was very like her own view back through the way she had traveled. The spring spreads first into a silver lake, whose beauty is beyond words to describe. So her child- hood passed into sunlit youth, where we all of us linger longest in the journey of life. " Hie breve vivitur," said Bernard, and then added, " hie breve plangitur, hie breve fletur." Life is short, but so too are its sorrow and mourning, and for most of us youth is long joy, full of de- lights. But the stream leaves the lake and plunges into the forest, struggling along through masses of tangled brush, and over the trunks of fallen trees and in dark ravines, receiving strength as it progresses, and overcom- ing with steadfast purpose all opposing obstacles. Then it sweeps along for miles in a glorious current, here lit by sunshine, there shaded by masses of rich verdure, until it enters a mountain gorge and goes down successive cat- aracts. Can that wild white water, foaming in rage, writhing in agony, beaten, bafiled, moaning and lifting up its floods to God in despair, can that stream of life ever again be placid ? Lo, here in front of the cottage it lapses softly over a mossy bed, and will flow on and on into the great sea on whose deeps the wildest storms have no effect, save only to make on its surface waves which to its vast soundings are less by far than were the ripples on the lake of youth.

232

I GO A-FISHING.

You get more fancies than facts in some days' fishing, and thus it was with me. These are parts of the angler's life, and I wish every angler would make a book to de- scribe the rises of this sort that he gets, and the thoughts which come up to his thoughtless casting.

The day was advanced before we reached Pollard's that afternoon. The valley of the East Branch lies south of Mount Lafayette, and heads up within two miles of the Crawford Notch. As you ascend it the hills separate, and I think there is nowhere in our northern Alps a more beautiful view than is spread out in every direction from Pollard's house, the last lonesome farm-house far up the valley.

I have said that I went to make some inquiries, and these were soon answered to my dissatisfaction. There was once a wood-road, leading some miles up the East Branch, above the Pollard farm. It is now grown up so that one can not go on horseback more than two miles from the house. I abandoned the idea of going to the Willey Pond by this route, and we drove rapidly home- ward.

The clouds which had been threatening us now and then during the day were driving black and furious down the Notch. They rested low on the hills, so that five hundred feet above us on each side the mountains were enveloped in mist which stretched across over head like a curtain, black, gloomy, rolling, tossing, folding and un- folding on the hill-sides, changing in a thousand ways, but never breaking its murky thickness.

As we approached the Profile House it seemed like the twilight of a night about to close in with tempestuous darkness. No light in the forest, no light on the cloud curtain, no mountain-top pointing upward. All was de-

THE CURTAIN OF GOLD. 233

pressing, heavy, gloomy, and we felt like prisoners ; nay, I fancy we felt somewhat like the man in the iron room, who saw, year by year, the ceiling slowly but steadily de- scending to crush him. We scarcely spoke to one another as we drove homeward.

And then, just as we reached the hotel, came a burst of splendor which I have no words to describe. Right up the gorge the clouds had suddenly vanished, as if by the word of the One who rideth on them. The horizon, the whole triangle formed by the sloping hill-sides and the line of the curtain over our heads, was clear as crystal, and the sun poured the glow of its last rays un dimmed right down the valley, under the curtain which still over- hung us. In an instant the curtain, which had been so black and fierce, became a mass of waving gold. From hill to hill it flamed over us in indescribable splendor. The mists on the mountain-sides were transformed into all manner of gorgeous - colored and fantastic shapes. Now they flew down the ravine like hosts of frightened angels, turning and seeking shelter in every ravine, under every rocky ledge — then flying on again. Now they climbed the hills, swiftly crowding one over another, as if they were visible spirits of light climbing the golden hills of heaven. Then the great curtain went rolling away and vanished in all its golden glory, as if gathered by in- visible hands swiftly up into heaven, revealing as it swept away, high up in their majesty, solemn, grand, and yet most holy in the radiance that now surrounded them, the clifls of the Eagles standing in an azure sky. So after a life of storm and a death of hope stands the memory of the good man gone home. So, after all gloom and all doubt, and all varieties of thought and creed, stands the sublime faith in which our fathers have died. So after

234 I GO A -FISHING.

Storms forever comes the calm ; so after gloom always comes the glory.

When I reached my rooms I found John Steenburger and Doctor Johnston disputing, with unbecoming ferocity of voice and manner, the rendering of a passage in Per- sius ; and when I came up after dinner they were still at it.

XII.

ON ECHO LAKE.

" I'm going to bed," said the Doctor at length, and off he went, leaving John and myself alone.

" This is like old times," said Steenburger as he drew his chair up before the fire. " I like this place. I used to think it the limit of all my travels to get as far off as this, and of all hopes of travel. I don't like it less, or any other place better even now."

''One may go much farther and see nothing better worthy his eye-sight. My hand is lame to-night, John. Bring me that book, please ; that's a good fellow. I have worked hard to-day, what with driving and fishing."

" I should think so. Where have you been ?"

" Up the East Branch to Pollard's ; and what a drive home that was ! The last rays of the sun made the Eagle Cliff shine out in golden splendor beyond all words to speak of."

"This valley reminds me sometimes of Chamouni. The lights of the afternoon sun are often the same."

" Yes ; but nowhere in the world is there any thing to match the grandeur of that Profile. It is the American wonder of the world. Niagara is nothing to it. It grows on me from year to year. The unutterable calmness of that face high up in the clouds is more impressive than the loftiest mountain or the most thunderous cataract."

236 I GO A -FISHING.

" I remember years ago you startled me with an idea as we were floating on the lake one afternoon. We had not spoken for a long time, when you suddenly said, 'John, God made that face in the mountain before he had formed man in his own image.' I never wondered after that at the old story that the Indians worshiped the great stone face."

"It is only a story. They never worshiped it. But the son of the forest was undoubtedly deeply impressed with the grandeur of that face. Its immutability in sun and storm could not but give to the red man, however thoughtless, the idea of immortality. He looked at it, and I do not think he could fail to catch the idea that the rocky face, stern, cold, and unimpressed with mind or thought, could not be equal in duration to the existence of man. The very clouds that drift over it, dashing their cold mists on the forehead of the mountain-man, taught him not to worship it. The winds that swept across it, with tempestuous laughter and moans, forbade him to think of it as other than a strange work of the Great Spirit, without soul, an emblem, a lesson. Nature spoke to him, and the face on the mountain had its voice, but com- manded only his respect for the mighty sculptor. Nature does not teach idolatry. That is one of the grandest les- sons of such scenery as this. The Chamouni Hymn, not Coleridge's, but the German — who was it? I forget — is very fine and tells the whole truth. The glacier, the Alp, the clouds, all alike speak of one ' to whom, wild Arvei- ron, rolls up the sound of thy terrible harmonies.' "

"I have never seen such evening lights as we have here."

" Nor I. The grandeur of evening in the Franconia Notch is beyond all words — nay, is beyond human ability

ROSY MOUNTAINS. 237

to appreciate. There are higher mountains, deeper ra- vines, more precipitous cliffs in the world, but nowhere in my wanderings have I found such lights as the departing sun leaves on the white hills of New Hampshire. Some- times in the Tyrol I have seen an approximation to this peculiarity, but only a distant approach. One I remem- ber in the valley of the Litany, when Hermon, snowy with his frozen dews, blushed in the evening over the departed glory of the once Holy Land; and the blush changed at last into the purple tint that seemed as if it were a far-off feeling of the glory from the chariot wheels of the Lord. But the way of his journeying was remote, and the glory was but for an instant, and vanished, and a sudden black- ness, a cold cloud of gloom, covered the hill and fell into the valley from Jebel-es-Sheik, and the sound of the Lita- ny was like the sound of mourning.

" The Alps boast of their rosy tints, and they are ex- ceedingly beautiful, sometimes very gorgeous, as who has not seen the Jungfrau from Interlaken, or Monte Rosa from the Cathedral of Milan. I have never seen the Rocky Mountains, but I have been told these same lights which characterize the White Hills are not uncommon on our western peaks. This I know, that no capacity for en- joyment is sufficient to appreciate the variety and change of the sunset and evening lights in the Franconia Notch — and though one has seen them a thousand times, he sees them each evening with new and sober delight, some- times rising into awe."

" Do you know, Effendi, that the greatness of that Pro- file oppresses me. I have been drifting around Profile Lake all the afternoon and evening in your boat, and studying the face. It becomes a sort of fascination, and by no means a pleasant one. You have seen the Lord

238 I GO A- FISHING.

Chancellor in the pass of Glencoe, and a dozen other such freaks of nature, but there is nothing remotely to be com- pared with this. The expression of his countenance is often fearfully like life. I have been all this evening dwelling on a fancy that in the remote ages, before the first Osirtasen was king in Egypt, or the race of Ninus were on the thrones of Asia, there was here a nation born of the sons of Noah, who built a city and inhabited the mountain country; that in process of time they grew to be very great and powerful, and their fame went abroad through the continent; that the fate of nations, that des- tiny of which the history of the past is the solemn proph- et for all the future, overtook this unknown race ; that war, famine, and pestilence swept them away ; that the convulsions of the earth hurled the mountains down on the ruins of their palaces, and after some mighty earth- quake that sent the great rocks from the very summits of the hills, filling the valleys, crushing the forests, hiding deep under rock and earth all traces of the old glories, yonder sad countenance was visible for the first time, and visible thenceforth forever, looking steadfastly downward to the grave of a forgotten race, a buried nation.

" Even so that unutterably grand countenance of the Sphinx looks over the plain of the Nile, over the sandy hills of the Necropolis, over the heaps of earth and wav- ing groves of palm that cover and hide every vestige of the once great Memphis. But there is this difference, that the countenance of this Man of the Mountain is only stern and sad, like— very like the faces of the Assyrian kings on the Nineveh^marbles, or that face of Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, on the temple wall at Karnak. There is expectation, but not hope in this countenance. The face of the Sphinx, with all its sadness, wears a smile.

THE PROFILE. 239

Sitting here to-night, I recall that face as you and I have seen it so often repeated on images throughout Egypt, always the same smiling countenance of majesty, unlike every other face in Egyptian sculpture. I can imagine to-night the starlight vanishing and the dawn breaking on that cold brow (for it is not yet midnight here, but the day is rising in Egypt), and I can see the smile with which the old image welcomes again, as so often, the calm clear dawn. That smile, the mystery of the Sphinx, I think we can understand. For in Egypt there shall be, and that before long, a new race and a new throne, and the tem- ples that for two thousand years have been waiting for worshipers shall be filled, and the dream of the old Egyp- tian, who built them for these later years as well as his own times, will be almost realized. There is hope in the smile of the Sphinx. But yonder old man of rock looks over hills from which a race has vanished never to re- turn. Not alone the race that I have imagined in the re- mote ages, but a later, a noble race, who will be forgotten like that other; who are already so forgotten that men can not name them in their own tongue, but speak of them as a people nameless and unknown. For them there is no hope ; and the old watcher for morning on the Fran- conia hills waits for no morning light on the people that have looked lovingly up to him for a thousand years. His face may well be sad forever."

" Fancies, John, but more satisfying sometimes than re- alities. Nevertheless I think you wrong the old man's expression. You are correct in this that his countenance indicates expectation, and I think it has also some very little but far-off hope united with that look of waiting; and this half hopeful half despairing look of waiting is what gives him to my eye his chief grandeur. The things that

240 I GO A -FISHING.

have gone by are nothing. He looks to the rising sun, but stands immovable with back to his setting. He looks always since God made him — before he made man in sim- ilar image — he looks forever to the coming day, to the coming generations, to the coming ages, and as the even- ing purple covers the slopes of Lafayette, he seems to look over the hills for some long-delayed yet ever waited- for appearance. And I never understood that look till I came up here once in May before the snows were gone, and then it seemed to me in the red evening that there was a veritable glory and terror in the old man's face — and I will tell you why it might be so, and why the sunset light might well be awe-full. When the advancing spring melts the snow from the sides of Mount Lafayette, it al- ways leaves a wonderful sign on the western slope of the great hill, which you can not see from the Profile House or from the ravine, but which if you go out of the mountains toward Franconia you will see — or better still if you climb to the rocky forehead of the Old Man, you will see as his stony eyes have seen it in the alternation of the seasons since the hills were reared by the word of the Almighty. There every day in the spring a great white cross, a thou- sand feet in height, five hundred feet from arm to arm, stands on the mountain-side, caused by the snow which lies in deep masses in three ravines. And when the sun goes down, the Old Man sees the cross grow red and purple in the strange weird light, and high over it the summit of the hill gleams like a flaming star as the night hides the splendor of the ruby sign. And the old watcher, taking no note of the days and years and ages that have gone down in the West behind him, looks every spring to the sign of his coming who shall bring back with him all that was worthy in the departed cycles, and every summer

FISHING IN HOLY LAND. 24I

and winter keeps liis eastward gaze unchanged toward that far-off light that he once saw over the Mountain of the Ascension."

" But here comes the Doctor again, just in time to in- terrupt our analysis of the Old Man's countenance. What now, Doctor ?"

" What has become of that monster of a trout that was in the aquarium here for two or three years V

" He died last fall, of old age I fancy. Wasn't he a beauty .?"

" Where was he taken V

" In Profile Lake. He weighed a little short of three pounds. The largest trout ever taken out of the lake. It was very odd. I was throwing a fly one evening, and had a dozen fine fish, when, just after dark, while I could scarcely see my fly on the water, I hooked a fine fish, and killed him in ten minutes. He was the largest fish that had been taken in the lake that year. He weighed a trifle over one pound and a half. Of course there was great excitement in the house in the evening, but the next

morning imagine our astonishment when C took that

noble fellow."

" What a persevering chap you are at the fish," said John. " Do you remember the mill of E'ma-al-a-ha ?"

" Never shall forget it. It has been a source of more serious consideration to my mind than any other spot of which at this moment I have any recollection. It bothers me. It perplexes me still. It keeps me awake o'nights."

"What's that, John?"

" When the Eflendi and I were in Northern Palestine, it chanced that we pitched our tents one evening on the bank of a large spring, some hundred feet across, nearly round, deep, and clear as crystal. It poured out a strong

Q

242

I GO A- FISHING.

Stream which turned a rude wheel of the mill of E'ma-al- a-ha. The spring was alive with fish. He was a perse- vering angler then, as now. He had taken some fish in the Sea of Galilee, descendants of the sacred fish of an- cient times ; he had whipped the Jordan with all sorts of flies ; he had, in fact, fished all the waters of Israel ; and this spring, pouring its water into the Lake Merom, on the Upper Jordan, was certainly as fine-looking a place to fish as we had seen. We could see hundreds of large fellows sailing around in the clear water, but we took no fish there — not a fish, not the fin of a fish."

John told the simple truth.

It was more unintelligible to me than the hieroglyphics of Egypt were to Champollion. It bothered me more than a cuneiform inscription. They were large fish ; they were plenty ; they were active. I had good tackle, enough of it. My old rod had done service in its day ; but it was of no use there. I tried every fly in the book. They did not even look at the cheats. I tried every bait imagin- able. They never approached it. I used all the insects and animals I could catch near the spring ; all the grubs and worms that live in the soil of the Jordan valley. I even tried raw meat and flour paste. I worked at the spring till long after dark, and began again at daylight in the morning: but it was of no use. Since then Dr. Thompson, of Sidon, the good and distinguished mission- ary, has told me that those fish are celebrated, and that no one has ever succeeded in taking one of them. But a few days' study and attention would do the work. It is only necessary to learn the habits of fish to be able to catch them.

" Have you killed any trout in Echo Lake this year ?" said the Doctor.

ECHO LAKE. 243

" Trout in Echo Lake !" exclaimed Steenburger. " I thought there were none there — only pickerel."

" Ah ! that's a discovery since you were last here, John. I'll tell you about it."

So I told the story of finding trout in Echo Lake.

We had taken fewer trout than usual in Profile Lake during the summer of 1867, although the previous year had been one of great abundance. We estimated that more than three thousand trout had been taken out of the lake each season for several summers in succession, and there had hitherto been no visible diminution of the supply. But it now became hard work to cast and get nothing. During the whole season only one trout weighing a pound had been taken in Profile Lake, and a few hun- dred smaller fish. The mountain streams, however, were more fully stocked than usual with small fish, which are so delicious for the table. Dupont and myself had done hard yet pleasant work in whipping those wild brooks, seldom visited by man's footsteps, and we took often three and four hundred fish in a day. In fact, after a few days, we counted them only by the basketfuls. The Pemige- wasset seemed inexhaustible. We fished it in sections. Those who know the localities will understand me when I say that one day we fished the stream from the Basin to the Pool, through the wild ravine which plunges down be- low the Plymouth Road. Another day we fished from Walker's Cascade brook to the Basin. Yet another day from the old mill below the lake to the Walker's Cascade brook. Besides this we fished the Cascade brook (not Walker's) from source to mouth in sections. The result was generally about the same each day, and we brought home enormous quantities of small trout, with an occa- sional half or three-quarter pound fish.

244

GO A -FISHING.

It had been for many years regarded as a settled fact that there were no trout in Echo Lake. Some one put pickerel in there years ago, and they have maintained possession. In 1859, a friend and myself devoted a day to taking fifty trout in Profile Lake and transferring them to Echo Lake, with the hope that a few of them might survive the attacks of the enemy, and eventually establish a colony there. But we never heard from them, and had never seen a trout rise on the surface of Echo Lake.

One evening toward the close of the season I per- suaded Dupont and C to go with me to Echo Lake.

" It's a great deal better to throw a fly where you know there are no trout, and so give patience a perfect trial," I said. And we went floating around the beautiful lake,

C standing in the boat with my rod, and casting now

and then inshore for a pickerel. Pickerel will take a fly with a rush, but they are not game after being struck. They come in like dead fish. It was a glorious afternoon, and we were enjoying the strong and various lights of the westering sun on the Eagle Cliffs and the slopes of Lafay- ette. There is in Echo Lake a certain spot where springs gush up from the bottom in about eight feet of water, sur- rounded by lily pads. We were gliding over this spot,

when C handed me my rod, with which he had been

casting, and said, " Take the rod while I look at this sun- set." I took the rod and carelessly threw over the spring- hole. As I drew across the still, black water, a sharp strike and a heavy plunge startled me from the seat where I had been holding the oars. A large fish went down with the line, and in an instant I found I must give him the reel. " The first pickerel I ever saw in Echo Lake to which I had to give the reel," I exclaimed as he rushed off. The next moment, as I checked him, and he swung

ECHO LAKE. 245

around on a long curve, he went into the air seventy-five feet off, and we shouted together, "It is a trout !" He was strong and lively. The reel sounded like a small watch- man's rattle. But he was engaged for the Profile House, and the only question was, " Can we secure him alive for the great tank ?" It took full ten minutes to tire him out, without attempting to kill him, and with much caution to do him as little injury as possible. We shouted to Frank at the boat-house to bring us another boat, and we filled it half full of water. By that time the trout was wearied out, and came tamely up to the side of the boat. We had no landing-net, for we had no thought of taking a large trout. So it was necessary to do that by no means easy thing, land him with the hand without hurting his gills. I did this at length, and the beautiful animal swam about the half-filled boat, not hurt, though sadly astonished. We sent up to the house for a tub, and in another half hour the old Profile Lake trout in the tank had a com- panion who weighed exactly three pounds and a quarter.

In some other waters this would be esteemed of no great account ; but a three-pound trout at the Profile House, and that out of Echo Lake, was certainly a sub- ject of astonishment. This was on a Thursday evening,

and the next morning, before I was awake, C was

off for home by one of the early stages.

The afternoon of Friday was clear but windy. There was more than a ripple — in fact a heavy sea — on Echo Lake. It was difficult to make an anchor hold. More than that, it was hard to rig an anchor, for they kept no ropes at Echo Lake. I cut a long birch pole, and with a short piece of cord fastened a large stone to one end, and made the other end fast to the oar-lock. With this I held on tolerably well ; and now, having a light rod, I

246 I GO A- FISHING.

was able to reach any point within a hundred feet to lee ward with the tail fly.

I pause a moment to describe the rod which I was using.

The weight, length, and material which are best suited to a rod will depend wholly on the circumstances under which it is to be used. I find on counting that I am possessed of eleven rods, and I have used every one of them more or less. Dismissing all but such as are suited to trout-fishing, I find some which I use more than oth- ers. One is a strong rod, thirteen feet in length, weighing ten ounces without the reel. I use this rod for black bass and for trout when fish are large and plenty, and I desire to kill as many as possible within a limited time. A heavy rod properly handled will kill a large trout quicker than a light one, but carelessly handled is much more likely to lose the fish. The next two rods are fac- similes one of the other — a light seven-ounce rod, twelve feet long, made with the utmost care by an experienced fisherman, each joint thoroughly tried, and the whole rod subjected to every proper test before it was regarded as complete. The tip bends to the butt, and flies back to a straight line. With one of these light rods I have during five years' use killed many hundred pounds of fish in Europe, Asia, Africa, and America; and I would not part with either of them to-day for a hundred times its cost. They were made by Mr. Thaddeus Norris, of Philadel- phia, an accomplished angler, and author of one of the best fishing-books we have. These two rods are for all kinds of fly-fishing, on lake, river, or brook. I have one Norris rod lighter still for occasional use.

The English fishermen do not, as a general rule, like our American liirht rods, and it is true that on their own

FLY RODS. 247

waters they kill more fish with their heavier tackle than an American working with them can kill with his light rod. But the converse is also true, that the American on our own waters with light tackle will kill more than the Englishman with heavy rod. I imagine the reason to be that the habits of the fish and their manner of taking the fly are different, and the Englishman in his own waters strikes his fish more securely with a heavy rod. Pos- sibly, practice on the water would bring the American's basket up to an equality. In my limited experience with trout in England I have found difficulty in striking suc- cessfully with my light rod, because, as it seemed to me, of the very gentle manner the fish had of rising to the fly. Yet at home there is no difficulty in striking the most delicate rise.

But when once you have hooked your fish the light rod is vastly to be preferred, after becoming accustomed to handle it, whatever and wherever be the water. For the principle of the rod is in reality only this, that it is the home end of the line, stiffened and made springy, so that you can guide and manage it — cast and draw it, keep a gentle pressure with it on the hook so that the fish shall not rid himself of it, and finally lift him to the landing- net. Let the young angler always remember that his rod is only a part of the line. The control which a properly constructed rod gives to the angler over his line and over a large fish on it is wonderful. For ordinary lake-fish- ing, American anglers are accustomed to cast from thirty to sixty feet of line from the end of the rod. I have seen an angler, under favorable circumstances, cast from a sev- en-ounce Norris rod a straight cast of ninety-four feet from the end of the rod, or, including the rod, a hundred and five feet of line from the hand, and repeat the cast

248 I GO A- FISHING.

again and again without varying the drop of the tail fly more than three feet. This is a tremendous cast, and few will be able to get out much over seventy feet.

Another of my rods is twelve feet long, and w^eighs nine ounces, the additional weight being chiefly in the second joint and tip. This makes a stifler rod, and suit- able for river and brook fishing, where the cover forbids long casting, and where a short line is often to be guided on running water among overhanging bushes.

The weight of the line will always depend on the weight of the rod. I prefer the ordinary braided-silk line to any other. The prepared lines are not objectionable until they are v/orn, when they give trouble. But all anglers have their fancies, as I mine, and the best rule for every one is to use the rod and line which best suits him. He is an ill-judging angler who allows himself to be made uncomfortable for the sake of following the notions of dilettant anglers. I have seen many times the nonsense of following rules. One evening, when the sun was going down on Follansbee Pond in a tempest, and large trout were rising as fast as I could throw two scarlet ibis flies, a strong fellow struck the bobber and carried away the leader, and I had not a red fly left in my book. I made up another leader with dark and light flies, but nothing rose. Then I saw that my old guide Steve Turner had on a red flannel shirt, and I shouted to him, for he was in another boat, for a piece of it. He whipped out his knife and cut off a piece and brought it to me; and with a rag of red flannel on each fly I took large trout at ev- ery cast, till the deep darkness and heavy rain drove me ashore. That was more than fifteen years ago, and Steve's red shirt has served my turn many a day since, and a fragment of it lies in an old fly-book to this day.

ECHO LAKE. 249

I have often used a white rag in the evening instead of a white moth. Better still sometimes I have found a strip of the white skin from a shiner's belly.

And now by your leave we will return to Echo Lake, where I stood with a light Norris rod in hand and two flies on my leader. The wind was heavy, and the waves swashed among the lily pads. A half-hour's casting brought nothing to the surface. It was nearly dark. No fly seemed worth any thing. Black, brown, red, gray, coachman, dun, cinnamon, and even the white moth, so successful at evening on Profile Lake, all failed. Could it be that I had taken the solitary trout of Echo Lake, last of his race ? At length I selected a large fly, with a bril- liant scarlet body and two stiff white wings of the ptarmi- gan feather. One long cast, and as this strange fly, un- like any thing on earth or water, sprang from one wave- top to another, there was a sharp rush, up into the air went a noble fish, and turning over struck down on the fly, and the whirr of the reel made its music in an instant. He was fast and away. A shout warned Frank to come out with his boat, and in a few moments a gentleman who was also near me, and had been casting over the same spot a few moments before, pulled toward me and lay off to see the contest. Small as a trout is, this contest be- tween him and a man is by no means unequal ; and with a strong, lively fish, the chances are against the human in such a case as this. For the wind was heavy and the lily stems were strong and abundant. The fish made a rush for the deep water, which sounds twenty-seven feet outside the lily pads. He had struck on fifty feet of line, and had more than eighty feet out when the lily stems brought him up and made it strongly probable that he would break away from the tackle. For let the uniniti-

250

I GO A-FISHING.

ated be informed that in trout-fishing very light tackle is used, and if a strong fish secures a chance for a steady pull or jerk against a firm resistance, he will probably break away. The one great law of all fishing with a fly- rod is this : " Never point the rod toward the fish, but keep it always up, so that he pulls on the spring of the rod." Therein lies the grand merit of the Norris rod. Its spring is steady, even, long, and easy. After a few mo- ments the fish drew the line through the lily stems and went away for deep water. As the darkness settled down the wind fell. This fish was one of the strongest trout I had ever landed. Although he weighed only a trifle over two pounds, he worked as bravely as any five-pound fish that I ever saw. Five, six, seven times he went out of water on the swing of the line. Trout never, in my ex- perience, throw themselves out of water. Black bass do it deliberately and ferociously. But trout seek usually to go down. When they are straining on the line and swim- ming in the arc of a circle, if they happen to start on a rush with the head up, or only parallel to the top of the water, the chances are that the spring of the rod will cant the head of the fish toward the surface, and out he goes in spite of himself. It sometimes happens, as in this case, that a strong fish, to whom you have given the butt (that is, the utmost force of spring which the rod has, including the butt as well as the rest of the rod), will thus go out of water several times before he is conquered. I wanted this fish alive, but it was growing dark and I was in a hurry. It was full ten minutes before I had him along- side for the first time. He was apparently overcome. The beautiful rod was bending in a graceful curve, almost a circle, when down he dashed, strong as ever, the tip of the rod brushing the fingers that held the butt, and again

ECHO LAKE. 2$ I

he was off with fifty feet of line. It was his last flurry, and now he came alongside and lay quiet, sinking into the net as it glided under him and lifted him gently into Frank's boat, which was ready for him. He was soon in the great tank in the house, and the three fish were worth looking at. This was on Friday evening. Saturday was stormy and wild. Sunday was one of those days of indescribable beauty which make the Profile House to seem sometimes in the land of Beulah. Mon- day was the last day of my stay that season at the Profile House, for we were to go northward in New Hampshire to fish the waters west and east of Dixville Notch, and had planned to leave on Tuesday morning for the ren- dezvous at Littleton. It seemed hardly worth while to expect any more such sport on Echo Lake, but as I rowed around the lake in the morning in a clear soft sunshine, and resting on the oars passed gently over the spring- hole, I looked down, and in six feet of water saw one soli- tary trout, apparently looking around for his lost com- panions. So toward sunset Dupont and myself went down, and after casting for an hour with all kinds of flies, but raising nothing, I put on the same queer fly with the scarlet body and white wings, and at the first cast up came the last of his race, so far as I knew, in Echo Lake, and I landed him after ten minutes of sharp struggling. He weighed a short two pounds. The same care was taken with him, and he reached the tank in the Profile House in fine condition. Four more beautiful trout were never seen together in a glass aquarium than these which attracted the admiration of the crowd of visitors at the Profile at the close of the season.

This ended the summer's fishing in the Franconia Notch, and the next day we started for the north.

252 I GO A-FISHING.

\\'hen I reached the Profile House the next year, I was curious to know whether there were any more of the same sort offish in Echo Lake, and went there several evenings in succession, but got nothing. I never knew another trout to rise on Echo Lake in the evening. But one morning, bright and sunshiny, between eleven and one o'clock, I saw trout rising near the spring-hole among the lily pads, and taking the hint I sent for my rod, and killed that day seven fish weighing severally from one pound and three quarters to two and three quarters. The next day, at the same hour and with the same bright sun- shine, I killed one weighing over three pounds and two that weighed nearly two pounds each. Since that time I have killed in Echo Lake over thirty fish, none of which weighed less than a pound. But there are no small fish in the lake, and pickerel abound, so that no increase of trout can be hoped for. The lake has now been ju- diciously stocked with black bass, and after a few years we hope they will enjoy undisputed possession.

XIII.

THREE BOTTLES OF CLARET.

It had been a delicious afternoon on Profile Lake ; one of those days when the very glory of the other country seems to come down among our mountains. The little lake had presented, as usual on such evenings, a gay and brilliant scene. It was a lake of Paradise. A dozen boats were out with parties of ladies or with anglers, some of the latter fishing with floats and worms, some casting flies, and now and then getting up fair trout. I had passed the time after a fashion that is somewhat lazy and luxu- rious, lying at full length in the bottom of my boat, drift- ing idly around while I read an old book, occasionally sinking into a doze and dreaming. As evening came down the various parties left the lake, and at last in the twilight Dupont came up in his boat alongside of mine, and we found ourselves, as often before, alone on the lake.

Among all my memories of trout-fishing there are none more pleasant than the memories of those evenings on Profile Lake, when my friend and I, with our boats at anchor a few rods apart, have cast our flies long after the darkness prevented our seeing their fall, and whether we got rises or not were content to see the stars come over the mountains, or the moonlight descend into the ravine and silver the surface of the lake.

254 I GO A-FISHING.

This evening was profoundly still ; not a breath of air disturbed the leaf of a tree. One could hardly hope to find a Profile Lake trout so foolish as to take a fly on such a glassy surface. I was lazy and indolent, but Du- pont was making long and steady casts, always graceful, and as sure as graceful. I paused and watched him. I could just see in the twilight the fall of his tail fly, some fifty feet away from his hand, as it touched the water close inshore under a great rock, and I felt in my own arm the thrill which was in his as I saw the slightest com- motion on the surface, and knew that a good fish had risen and "sucked in" the fly without striking it. It was a very pretty contest then, with his light Norris rod and a fish that would weigh over a pound. The silence was profound. No sound on water or land or in the air. Few night birds are heard in our forests thereabouts, and in the cool evenings the insects are still. So I looked on while he patiently wearied and landed his fish — a good size for this over-fished lake, where the trout have little chance to grow large. It is in some respects the most wonderful trout pond I have ever known. In the rush of travel hundreds of men and boys, and many ladies, take trout here every summer. Few days in July and August see less than ten or fifteen rods on the lake. We have estimated an annual catch of at least three thousand trout in this small pond, and the supply seems equally great each year. This is largely due to the protection of the smaller pond above the lake, which is the breeding-place, and where no fishing is permitted.

I had taken nothing. In fact, I had not made a dozen casts. But now I began to work, laying the flies away in the shoal water near the inlet. It is the advantage of fly-fishing that one can cover so large a space of water

BEFORE DAYLIGHT. 255

without moving position. It is an easy matter in still weather to whip every inch of a circle of a hundred and fifty feet diameter.

The fisherman who tries the water of a new lake, un- certain whether there be any trout in it, should, if possible, cast at evening near an inlet. He will often find the largest trout in water not over six inches deep. It is probable that at this hour of the day the large trout are on the feed, and seek near the inlet the smaller fish as well as insects. I remember an evening in Northern New Hampshire, when Dupont and myself took twenty-seven trout between sunset and an hour after dark, every one of which weighed over two pounds, and every one took the fly in water about ten inches deep. There was a brilliant full moon that night, and they rose later than usual. An old Adirondack guide has frequently told me that in those waters large trout rise freely to the fly be- tween one and three o'clock in the morning, I have never been able to verify his saying, for I have never loved fishing well enough to toil all night at it as did the apos- tles, nor to get out of bed very long before day. I have, however, not infrequently cast for a half-hour before the dawn on water where trout were abundant, and I never got a rise until day was fairly shining. But I am not willing to place my limited experience against the asser- tion of the guide, backed as it was by the statement of sportsmen that they had known him to go out of camp at midnight and return before daylight with a load of trout. In some of the streams of the Pacific coast I have been told trout are taken with bait at all hours of the night in streams where one is seldom taken in daylight. All this goes to the question whether fish sleep, a question not yet satisfactorily answered.

256 I GO A-FISHING.

I could not provoke a rise, and it grew dark apace. I threw my line back for a long cast. It was very near be- ing a case of broken rod, for there was a sharp jerk as the flies went through the air, the line came in all in a heap, and something fell into the water close to the boat. I picked up the slack and hauled in — a bat. The wretch had taken a small black gnat, and the hook was in his throat. So much for casting a fly in the dark. It was the last cast I made that evening. We went ashore and strolled up the dark road to the hotel.

The windows blazed their light into the gloom of the Notch, making a strange contrast to the darkness of the forest road from which we emerged. The sound of the music in the drawing-room drove all forest ideas out of one's head. It was nine o'clock, and the dancing had begun. The Profile House is a small world in the midst of the mountain solitudes. Including guests and persons employed about the house, there were nearly eight hun- dred men, women, and children there that night, and every station in life was represented.

Have I any where in these sketches mentioned my old friend, Major Wilson ? He was sometimes one of our group at the Rookery in years past, but since he had grown to full age he seldom ventured far from his own dinner-table. Why should he, since he esteemed it the main luxury of life .? Do not imagine him a useless man, a mere hon-vivant. He was a hearty old man, a patron of art, and very generous withal. A man is none the worse for loving a good dinner. Gastronomy is as much one of the fine arts as trout-fishing or sculpture. It is very depraved taste which despises good cookery. Table decoration, furniture, and provision form almost the only safe standard by which to estimate national or individual

CIVILIZATION. 257

civilization; for civilization is not, as some people imag- ine, a question of morals or religion. Christianity is not synonymous with civilization ; neither does its introduc- tion civilize a nation. It deals with the individual man, not with communities. Men call New York a Christian city, England a Christian country, the people of the United States a Christian people. This is pure nonsense. There are not more than one in ten, perhaps not more than one in a hundred, of the people who are in any proper sense Christians; whose morals, manners, or characters have been directly touched by the refining influences of person- al Christianity. Obviously the influence and example of the Christian has its effect on his companions, but that is no reason for calling a people Christian who have only a small sprinkling of Christians among them. Nor can we stand a comparison with some heathen nations. Chris- tianity can not afford to be saddled with the absurd and barbarous customs of our social life, or with the manners and customs of so-called Christian peoples, especially when it appears that the civilization of Japan is in many respects in advance of that of England or America. We have innumerable habits and manners which are barba- rous. The dress of a gentleman or of a lady in New York in this year 1873 is barbarous, whether regarded by standards of taste, comfort, or usefulness. A dress-coat was no more absurd a costume on the West Coast African, who wore nothing else, than it is on the diner-out of New York. A stove-pipe hat is so thoroughly ridiculous that no barbarous nation has ever invented any thing remote- ly resembling it.

Seek a standard where you will, and, after all, it will be found that the manner and matter of feeding is a tolera- bly safe one by which to measure comparative civilization.

R

258 I GO A- FISHING.

The Major had been a week or two at the Profile House, living at his ease, and rather content with the table, which was not by any means a poor one, and sol- aced for any minor failures by his own wine. He did not wander much among the mountains, but contented him- self, book in hand, with the sunshine on the broad piazza, and evenings in his own rooms, where his man John, who had been his personal servant more than thirty years, took care to make him comfortable. His rooms were near mine, and that evening after Dupont and myself had dined — for I make it dinner however late the coming home occurs — I went to see the Major.

One can be very comfortable in a summer hotel if he will take a little trouble and go to a little expense. One can not be comfortable at any summer hotel in America or the world without these. The rooms of my friend were two ordinary bed-rooms, one of which he used as a salon; and by a very little exertion it had been made into a cozy and rather brilliant room. The table was literally covered with books and periodicals, for the Major had a hunger for reading which could never be satisfied, and every mail brought him packages. He was tearing off the envelope from an Innspruck book-catalogue as I en- tered the room, and I recognized the label of an old ac- quaintance.

" So you get catalogues from Carl Pfaundler, do you ? I have picked up some good things in his shop."

"Yes. I have a pretty extensive list of booksellers sending me their catalogues, but it's getting to be rather a nuisance. I've about done with buying old books. Come in; find a chair — John, a chair — help yourself to the claret. You dined late I fancy. Did you get me a good trout for breakfast?"

AMERICAN MARKETS. 259

"Not a trout. I took a bat on the wing. Did you ever eat bat.?"

" Never. I suppose it would be about the same thing as mice. Mice are not good ; the flavor is musky. Rats are much better, and very decent eating, if they are prop- erly fed. I don't know why bats might not be made eat- able. They are carnivorous ; but dogs are good food, if well cooked. However, we don't need to try experiments in this land, where the markets are better than in any other country on earth."

" I'm glad to hear you say that. Major. I have said it often, and it's pleasant to be backed by a man of your gastronomic taste."

"Who disputes it? Surely no one who knows any thing about eating. There are articles, of course, which are to be found in other countries superior to the same article here ; but America is the only land for general good eating. One gets fearfully tired of a European kitchen, even with all the resources of Paris in the palmi- est days of The Brothers. But here the varieties of fish and flesh are inexhaustible ; and fruit — nowhere in the world is there a fruit market comparable with that of New York. An English sole is not equal in flavor to a flounder taken in clear water at Stonington, and a turbot is no better than a tautog. Shad, sheepshead, Spanish mackerel, red snappers, bass, blue-fish — a fresh blue-fish is glorious — where will you stop in the list of fish that abound on our coast, every one of which is better than any salt-water fish known on the other side of the At- lantic ?"

" Excepting sardines."

" Well, I may perhaps except sardines."

" May ? None of your prejudices, old fellow. There's

26o I GO A-FISHING.

no dish of fish to be invented equal to sardines, fried and served as they used to do it in the old San Marco at Leghorn. I lament the closing of that house with pro- found regret. I have gone down from Florence more than once to pass a night there just for the sake of the delicious breakfast I used to get on those sardines. No one else cooked or served them so in any town on the French or Italian coast."

" I remember fifty years ago seeing them catch sardines along the shore at Naples."

" Yes, I have sat many a morning in the window at the old Vittoria, looking out on the sea and watching the sar- dine nets come in, glittering with diamonds; and I have taken them with a rod at Leghorn."

" I never found trout south of the Alps. Why is that ?"

" Simply because you never looked for them yourself. The hotels rarely furnish them ; but you can get them in Lombardy if you want them. I have taken trout in the Izak above Trent, and at Botzen."

" My dear boy, what a muddle your brain must be in about historic places. The idea of talking about trout- fishing at Trent, a place with which one never associated any idea but of profound ecclesiastical and theological significance."

"There's a charm in trout-fishing, Major, which you would have appreciated if your education had not been neglected. It has never failed me; and I have studied no small amount of history as I strolled along the bank of a trout stream. Were you ever at Salzburg ?"

"Three several times, and always fared well at the Hotel de I'Europe."

" Ah yes, you think first of the hotel. So do many old travelers. So I confess do I sometimes. A poor inn is

TROUT IN THE TYROL. 26 1

a fearful obstacle to the enjoyment of art or antiquity. But there are trout streams around Salzburg, and some fine trout in them ; and I have passed some of the pleas- antest days along those streams, looking up at the grand pile of the Untersberg, in whose caverns the two emperors sit face to face, sleeping, but now nearly ready to wake. I was fishing there in June, 187 1, and wondering what could happen to rouse the mighty Charles, and a month later the thunders of Weissembourg must have shaken the im- perial slumbers. But Ischl, Major, Ischl — were you ever at Ischl ? It is the most lovely spot in Europe. Go there before you die, and don't go to the Hotel Bauer on the hill, but to Sarsteiner's, The Kreutz, a capital inn, with old books in the halls, and pictures of all sorts of places, and large bed-rooms and saloons, and a kitchen that is not to be surpassed in or out of the Tyrol. It will suit you. The valley of the Traun is a glorious place, and the river is the only river my eyes ever saw which is in- disputably superior in beauty of water to our White Mount- ain streams. The delicate apple-green tint does not harm its transparency. You can see bottom in twenty feet of water. It flows like a liquid chrysoprase, and the trout and grayling in it are superb. Mr. Sarsteiner controls all the fishing in the valley, and is himself an angler, a man of reading and extensive travel, and is interested in fish-breeding. The fishing is close at hand too. I went out of the house one evening about seven o'clock, and walked in five minutes to the other side of the Traun, just above the bridge and opposite the promenade, where the river glides swiftly down over a pebble bottom. It was nearly dark, but in fifteen minutes I had a half-dozen good trout which the boy stowed safely in a barrel; for in Switzerland and the Tyrol, when you go a-fishing, you

262 I GO A- FISHING.

have always with you a boy who carries a small barrel in which it is his duty to keep the fish alive until they are transferred to the tank which every inn keeps stocked with plenty of trout. It had gotten to be quite dark, and I was casting a large white moth across the swift current, when I got the heaviest strike, with one exception, that I ever felt from a trout in Europe. He made a splendid struggle; but the little Norris rod did its duty, and I brought him to barrel in a few minutes — that is to say, I landed and unhooked him, and handed him to the boy while I hurried to cast again. I had made only one cast when the boy shouted, ' He's too big for the barrel ;' and I turned to laugh at his vain endeavors to crowd his tail into the hole. He was, in fact, two inches longer than the barrel, which had not been made in expectation of such fish. So I slipped him into his short quarters, and gave up the sport, and in five minutes he was the admira- tion of a crowd in the kitchen of the Golden Cross, swim- ming around in a small tank into which cold spring water poured a steady stream. He weighed only two and three quarter pounds English; but Mr. Sarsteiner told me that, though he had seen larger trout there, he was one of the largest, if not the largest, that he had ever known taken with a fly in the Tyrol. All the way up the river to Lake Haldstadt there are plenty of fine trout, and I have en- joyed many a day's sport along the beautiful stream."

" Now for the exception."

" What exception ?"

" You said it was the heaviest strike, with one excep- tion, that you ever felt in Europe."

"I'm a little ashamed of that other. You remember the Rhine above the falls, from Schaffhausen to the Cha- teau Laufen ? I was fishing it one evening, years ago, in

TROUT IN THE RHINE. 263

a boat, with a strong German boy to row. I had to keep a sharp look-out, for the current is wild, and it is not quite sure that, if you are careless, you may not go over the falls. By-the-by, Major, with all our boasting, we haven't many cataracts in America as fine as the Rhine Falls. It's a grand piece of scenery. It looks better from below than above, however, if you happen to be in a heavy boat with a stupid boy as oarsman. We were just on the edge of the swift water, and I told him to hold on by the bushes and keep the craft steady while I cast. He obeyed, until a tremendous swirl and swash startled him as a trout struck the fly. The rush was so sudden that the boy was absolutely scared, so that he let go the bushes, and the boat swept right across the line at the same instant that the trout went down. My second joint broke close to the butt ferrule, and we went like lightning toward the falls. I dropped my rod to seize an oar, and threw my whole weight on it. The boat yielded, took the cant I intended, and plunged bow on into the bank, where I seized the bushes and held on till the young Teuton came to his senses. Meantime the second joint and tip had gone overboard, and the reel was paying out. I brought in line very gently, and grasping the lower end of the sec- ond joint, dropped the butt, and proceeded to try an old and difficult plan of using the hand instead of a reel. As soon as I got in slack enough I felt the fish. He was at the bottom, and made a rush when he felt the first steady pressure of the tip. It took me twenty minutes, with sec- ond joint and tip, to kill that trout, well on to four pounds' weight, and the largest I ever killed east of the Atlantic. That same evening I took twenty more trout, and no one of them went over four ounces."

"I am one of the few," said the Major, sipping his

264 I GO A -FISHING.

claret appreciatively, and then tossing the full glass down his capacious throat, as if to wash a way out for talk — " I am one of the few who once loved angling, but have lost their taste for it. I've been latterly thinking the matter over, and— can you justify yourself in it.? Isn't it cruelty to animals? You know these are days in which men are getting to have notions on that subject."

" I've no objection to their notions, and I have the highest opinion of the society for the prevention of cruel- ty to animals; but we must guard our sympathies that they do not go too far. No man of decency will be guilty of wanton cruelty to a beast. I have a warm love for some beasts. My dogs, my horses, have I not loved them ? But there is much nonsense afloat on the sub- ject. I rate the life of a beast somewhat lower than that of a man, and his comfort in the same ratio. I must often work even when I am sick. Rheumatism bothers me, and I have frequently to walk and even run when I am lame. Yes, perhaps it is gout. We won't discuss that; but lame or not I must work. Business requires it. I would drive a lame horse for the same reason. A poor carman can not afford to let his horse rest, any more than he can afford to rest himself, on account of a slight ailment. It's an error therefore to suppose it always wrong to get work out of a suffering animal. So, too, I would kill a horse to accomplish a result which I valued at a higher rate than the life of the horse, if I could not accomplish it in any other way. Some philanthropists, good men, but thoughtless, who would never dream of blaming a man for earning his bread and that of his chil- dren when he was sick and suffering, but would rather commend him, would fine and imprison him for working his sick horse with the same necessity impelling him.

CRUELTY TO BEASTS. 265

" They should try to make a reasonable distinction in these matters between wanton cruelty and the necessary work that we must get out of a sick animal. I never saw a nobler beast, or one to which I was more thoroughly attached than my bay horse Mohammed; but great as he was and much as I loved him, do you not believe I would have ridden him through fire and tempest till he fell down dead, if it were necessary to save his mistress, who loved him as well as I, a pain or a sorrow ? Should I let her suffer to save a horse from suffering? Does your notion of charity extend so far as that } mine does not. I might give myself pain to save him pain ; but her? — Never. Mohammed would have said so too if he could have spoken. I know he would.

" In war this whole subject is understood well, and no one thinks of finding fault with the destruction of the lives of beasts to accomplish the purposes of men ; for in war human life is freely expended to purchase results. Who would blame an officer for using his lame, sick, dy- ing mules and horses to the last moment to accomplish an object in the face of the enemy? It is then a mere question with beasts and with men, how much must be sacrificed to do the work. Would you require them to let sick mules rest in hospital, if they had no others?"

"Then you don't approve of stopping cars and omni- busses in New York, and compelling the passengers to dismount and find other conveyances, because the horses are lame ?"

" Not at all. It is well meant, but it is bad in princi- ple, and injures the society which does it. It would be right and proper to take a note of the horses and their owners and drivers, and make the necessary complaint in the police court, and if the animals were treated with

266 I GO A -FISHING.

wanton cruelty punish the guilty. But the time of a pas- senger is often worth thousands of dollars per minute, and the probability of such value outweighs all consider- ations of comfort to horses. In the days of the horse disease, when all the cities were suffering, it was both necessary and proper to use sick horses for transporta- tion. It was a pure question of money value then. Shall a merchant allow ten thousand dollars' worth of perish- able goods to decay for the sake of saving the health or the comfort of a cart-horse ? Yet the absurd proposition was forced on the public that it was their duty to sacri- fice their own comfort, property, and health to the com- fort of the horses. Nonsense. If you had a sick child, would you hesitate to kill a horse if necessary to get a surgeon or a physician in time to save the child's life? If you had a loaded wagon full of perishable articles of great value, would you hesitate to use your lame horses, or kill them if necessary to save your property ? Let us teach kindness to animals, men and beasts, and make it infamous to treat them with unnecessary or wanton cru- elty ; but don't let us get our ideas mixed up on the sub- ject, so that we place the comfort of the beasts above that of the men. For all our purposes the comfort and the life of a beast have a measurable value. The owner is the judge of that value to him."

" But how about killing fish for sport ?"

" In the name of sense, man, if God made fish to be eaten, what difference does it make if I enjoy the killing of them before I eat them ? You would have none but a fisherman by trade do it, and then you would have him utter a sigh, a prayer, and a pious ejaculation at each cod or haddock that he killed ; and if by chance the old fellow, sitting in the boat at his work, should for a mo-

MORALITY OF ANGLING. 267

ment think there was, after all, a little fun and a little pleasure in his business, you would have him take a round turn with his line, and drop on his knees to ask forgiveness for the sin of thinking there was sport in fishing.

"I can imagine the sad-faced, melancholy-eyed man, who makes it his business to supply game for the market as you would have him, sober as the sexton in Hamlet, and forever moralizing over the gloomy necessity that has doomed him to a life of murder ! Why, sir, he would frighten respectable fish, and the market would soon be destitute.

"The keenest day's sport in my journal of a great many years of sport was when, in company with some other gentlemen, I took three hundred blue-fish in three hours' fishing off Block Island, and those fish were eaten the same night or the next morning in Stonington, and supplied from fifty to a hundred different tables, as we threw them up on the dock for any one to help himself. I am unable to perceive that I committed any sin in tak- ing them, or any sin in the excitement and pleasure of taking them.

" It is time moralists had done with this mistaken mo- rality. If you eschew animal food entirely, then you may argue against killing animals, and I will not argue with you. But the logic of this business is simply this: The Creator made fish and flesh for the food of man, and as we can't eat them alive, or if we do we can't digest them alive, the result is we must kill them first, and (see the old rule for cooking a dolphin) it is sometimes a further necessity, since they won't come to be killed when we call them, that we must first catch them. Show first, then, that it is a painful necessity — a necessity to be avoided

268 I GO A -FISHING.

if possible — which a good man must shrink from and ab- hor, unless starved into it, to take fish or birds, and which he must do when he does it with regret, and with sobri- ety and seriousness, as he would whip his child, or shave himself when his beard is three days old, and you have your case. But till you show this, I will continue to think it great sport to supply my market with fish.

" Between ourselves, Major, I am of opinion that Peter himself chuckled a little when he took an extra large specimen of the Galilee carp, and I have no doubt that he and James, and even the gentle and beloved John, pulled with a will on the miraculous draught of fishes."

" Probably you are right ; but I have lost my love for the sport. I can hardly say how it came about with me. I think it was the result of a long illness which I had in my middle life, and from which I recovered slowly, and in such strict confinement that the love of reading grew on me, and other employments lost the zest which I once found in them. I sometimes wonder now how you can read all winter and go a-fishing all summer as you do. I can't separate myself from my books."

"You are growing quite too bookish of late years, if you will pardon me for saying so, my old friend."

"As how?"

" I mean that you are getting to be dreamy in your manner, and you don't seem to realize the common events of life. You live so much among thoughts and imagina- tions that you're getting to be quite useless as a com- panion, except when one wants to talk or listen."

"I haven't lost my appreciation of claret."

" So I perceive."

" Your glass is empty. Help yourself."

" Thanks ; I'm doing very well."

LITERATURE OF ANGLING.

269

" Talking of books and fishing, Effendi, did you ever come across the ' Dyalogus Creaturarum ?' "

" Yes, I have the Gouda edition of Leeu, 1482 I believe is the date."

" There's a comical little picture of a fisherman in it, illustrating a fabled talk between two fish. I don't know whether there is any older picture of the gentle art in ex- istence, but that is worth noting as a historical illustration, for the angler there uses a float."*

" The literature of angling is abundant, and art has al- ways found ample range in its illustration. I have seen a score of pictures of fishing on ancient Egyptian monu- ments. Many modern artists are enthusiastic anglers. And in what kind of life could they find more of the beau- tiful ? Look at a trout. Is there any object more exqui- sitely beautiful ?"

" Yes, a small rattlesnake."

"Gaudy, Major, and brilliant, but the brilliancy of the

* I have thought the Major's suggestion so good that I here repro- duce the illustration, in fac-simile, from the "Dyalogus Creaturarum." Gouda, Gerard Leeu, 1482.

270 I GO A-FISHING.

diamond and ruby compared with the soft glow of the pearl. Do you know these little Pemigewasset trout are so exquisite in their pearl and rose colors that I didn't wonder the other day at the exclamation of a very pretty girl in the chariot on the way to the Flume, when they pulled up by me down the river and asked to see my basket. ' Oh, I want to kiss them,' she said."

" You did'nt know her?"

" Never saw her before, or since."

" It was a fresh remark. I like it. I wonder who she was. It's a pleasant thing now and then to hear a bit of nature out of red lips."

" Your experience in the utterances of red lips "is rather limited. Major. I was telling you just now that you live too much on books and too little on realities."

" On red lips, for instance .?"

" Exactly. An old bachelor like you has great oppor- tunities in life. You might take to fishing even, and per- haps some day, when you have a full basket, a pretty girl may ask you to let her look at the speckled beauties, and then — what might not happen as a consequence .?"

" Bah ! I've been through it all."

" You ?"

(( T >J

" Fishing and—"

" Red lips— yes. Redder than this blood of the grape, and a thousand times as maddening. What do you boys of these late years fancy you can teach me, either in sports of the forest or loves of the town. I had drunk all the wine of that life up, and the cup was empty before you were born."

The Major was excited, and his dates were evidently confused. But it was refreshing to be called a boy, and

NIGHT IN THE FOREST. 27 1

I urged him on. He told stories of old sporting days, which proved that he was no idle boaster when he said he had gone through all that. He grew fairly brilliant as he talked.

"I remember," said he, "the very last night I ever passed in the forest. It had been some years then since I had given up my rifle and rod, but an old companion persuaded me to join him in November in Sullivan County, in New York, and I went up the Erie Railroad to Narrows- burg, and struck out into the woods for a ten-mile tramp to our appointed place of meeting. I knew the country as well as you know these mountains, but at evening I had loitered so that instead of being near the cabin of our old guide I was three miles away; darkness was set- tling down fast, and a heavy snow-storm was evidently coming on. I, who had often said I would never camp out again so long as roofs remained among the inhabit- ants of earth, found myself wishing for the darkest hole in a rock or a hollow tree. Is it that the ground is not so soft a bed as it used to be, or have we grown harder ?

"Night and gloom thickened around me. My eyes, from watching the clouds, retained vision of them longer than one who opened his suddenly at the place and time would have believed possible. The trees had passed through the various shapes and shadows which they as- sume in the twilight and first darkness. They were grim, tall giants, some standing, some leaning, some fallen prone and lying as they fell, dead and still; and some had gone to dust that lay in long mounds, like the graves of old kings. I kept on, pushing my way steadily, for there was no spot that I could find fit for a resting-place, and I had hope of reaching a good point for the night-halt by proceeding. I hit on it at length. There was a hill down

272 I GO A- FISHING,

which I went, tripping at every fourth step, and plunging into indescribable heaps of brush and leaves and stones, until I came out suddenly on the edge of a piece of burnt land, which a fire had gone over last summer. A pile of fallen trees lay on the very border of the unburned forest, and I sought shelter among them from a driving blast, which now brought snow with it in quantities. I faced the tempest a moment, and thought of that passage in which Festus described the angels thronging to Eden, and ' alighting like to snow-flakes.' I wished that there were more similarity, and that the flakes were fewer and farther between. But there was a terrible reality in the night and storm, which drove poetry from my brain. At this moment I discovered a pile of hemlock bark, gathered by some one to be carried to the tanneries. It was the first indication of this being an inhabited part of the world ; but it was no proof that inhabitants were near, for these piles of bark are often gathered in remote parts of the forest. But it was a great discovery. There was enough of it to roof the City Hall ; and in fifteen minutes there was as neat a cabin built among the fallen timber as any man could desire under the circumstances. It was artist- ically built too, for I had built such before ; and, by-the- by, I recollect one which Joe Willis once constructed, in which the chimney arrangements proved unsafe, and we awoke at about daylight among the flames of our entire establishment. True, he laid it to my restlessness in the night, and actually charged me with getting my feet into the fire and scattering the coals, while I dreamed of the immortal — who was it that won immortality by setting fire to the Temple of Diana ? But it was false, atrociously

false. I was dreaming of , but let that pass.

" The w^ind grew furious, and the snow came thicker,

NIGHT IN THE FOREST. 273

finer, and faster, but none reached me as I sat in my shelter, open indeed on one side, but fully protected there by a fire built at a safe distance, which blazed as a pile should blaze that was the funeral pyre of more than one of the forest giants.

" And now the sound of the wind in the forest grew ter- rible in the grandeur of its harmonies. A lonesome man, far from my fellows, the sole human companion of the storm, the sole human witness of the fury of the tempest, I sat, or lay, half-reclined on the heap of brush that I had gathered for a bed, and with my hand screening my face from the intense heat of the fire, looked out into the abyss of darkness, and watched the snow-flakes driving from far up down toward the flames, as if they sought instantane- ous and glad relief from cold and wretched wanderings ; and I wondered whether, of intelligent creatures, I was alone in that wild, grand, and magnificent scene.

" Sometimes I thought I could hear human voices in the lull of the storm ; but oftener I imagined that the in- habitants of other worlds were near, and that they were unearthly sounds which were so strange and abrupt and startling ; and when I closed my eyes I was certain that, among all the confusion, I could hear the rushing wings of more than ten legions of angels ; and in a mo- ment of still calm, one of those awful pauses that occur in furious storms, in the deep, solemn silence I heard a cry, a faint but wild and mournful cry, and it seemed far off, farther than the forest, farther than the opposite mount- ain, beyond the confines of the world, and the cry grew into a wail — a wail of unutterable anguish, agony, and woe — such a wail as might have been Eve's when the flaming sword flashed between her and Abel ; and it came nearer, nearer, nearer, and it filled the air, the sky,

S

274

I GO A- FISHING.

the universe it seemed, and thrilled through my soul till I sprang to my feet, and dashed out into the blinding, mad tempest. It was so long since I had heard it, that I had forgotten that voice of the mountain wind ; but now I re- membered it as the blasts swept by me, wailing, shouting, laughing, shrieking, and I retired to my warm nook, and laughed back at the storm, and slept and dreamed. I never slept better.

" I awoke at day-break, and the storm was over. A blue break in the clouds let through the light of a Novem- ber moon, clear, soft, and exceedingly beautiful. Dawn drove the moonlight out of the forest, and I pushed on then and got my breakfast with old Steven in his cabin. I have never slept in the forest since that night. Help yourself to the claret, Effendi. It seems to me it's grow- ing cold. Yes j I have led that life, and liked it well enough once."

"You've told me of your forest experiences. Major, but you rather fight shy of the subject of the red lips."

" I tell you I have tasted the wine of red lips to intox- ication : but there were lips that I never touched whose utterances were more intoxicating."

The Major sat looking into the fire; for though it was August we had bright wood fires in the evenings, as we often do at the Profile House. He looked very steadily at the coals on the hearth, shivered once as if he were cold, bolted two glasses of claret in quick succession, and I waited, confident that I should hear his story at last. Soon he began to talk.

" Draw your chair close up. Light another pipe, and fill your glass. It is a cold night. My old bones shudder when I hear the wind wail over the house and through the trees. Capital claret, that! John, come in here.

THE MAJORS STORY. 275

Open another bottle of claret, John. What, not another ! Certainly, man, I must have it. This is only the second,

and Mr. has drank half, of course. Not drank any !

You don't mean to say that he has been drinking nothing all the blessed evening ? Effendi, I thought you knew my rules better than that. But you always would have your own way.

" One more bottle, John — but one. It shall be the last ; and, John, get some Maraschino — one of the thick, black bottles with the small necks, and open it. But you know how, old fellow, and just do your best to make us com- fortable.

" How the wind howls ! My boy, I am seventy-three years old, and seven days over. My birthday was a week ago to-day.

" An old bachelor ! Yea, verily. One of the oldest kind. But what is age? What is the paltry sum of seventy years ? Do you think I am any older in my soul than I was half a century ago ? Do you think, because my blood flows slower, that my mind thinks more slowly, my feelings spring up less freely, my hopes are less buoy- ant, less cheerful, if they look forward only weeks instead of years ? I tell you, boy, that seventy years are a day in the sweep of memory ; and 'once young forever young' is the motto of an immortal soul. I know I am what men call old; I know my cheeks are wrinkled like parchment, and my lips are thin, and my head gray even to silver. But in my soul I feel that I am young, and I shall be young till the earthly ceases and the unearthly and eternal be- gins.

" I have not grown one day older than I was at thirty- two. I have never advanced a day since then. All my life long since that has been one day — one short day ; no

276 I GO A- FISHING.

night, no rest, no succession of hours, events, or thoughts has marked any advance.

" I have been living forty years by the light of one memory — by the side of one grave.

" John, set the bottle down on the hearth. You may go. You need not sit up for me. We will see each other to bed to-night. Go, old fellow, and sleep soundly.

" She was the purest angel that flesh ever imprisoned, the most beautiful child of Eve. I can see her now. Her eyes raying the light of heaven — her brow white, calm, and holy — her lips wreathed with the blessing of her smile. She was as graceful as a form seen in dreams, and she moved through the scenes around her as you have seen the angelic visitors of your slumber move through crowded assemblies, without effort, apparently with some superhuman aid.

" She was fitted to adorn the splendid house in which she was born and grew to womanhood. It was a grand old place, built in the midst of a growth of oaks that might have been there when Columbus discovered Amer- ica, and seemed likely to stand a century longer. They are standing yet, and the wind to-night makes a wild la- ment through their branches.

" I recall the scenery of the familiar spot. There was a stream of water that dashed down the rocks a hundred yards from the house, and which kept always full and fresh an acre of pond, over which hung willows and ma- ples and other trees, while on the surface the white blos- som of the lotus nodded lazily on the ripples with Egyp- tian sleepiness and languor.

"The old house was built of dark stone, and had a massive appearance, not relieved by the sombre shade in which it stood. The sunshine seldom penetrated to the-

THE MAJORS STORY. 277

ground in the summer months, except in one spot, just in front of the Hbrary windows, where it used to He and sleep in the grass, as if it loved the old place. And if sunshine loved it, why should not I ?

" General Lewis was one of the pleasant, old-fashioned men, now quite gone out of memory, as well as out of ex- istence. He loved his horses, his dogs, his house, his punch. He loved his nephew Tom, uncouth, rough cub that he was; but above horses, dogs, house, or all to- gether, he loved his daughter Sarah, and I loved her too.

" Yes, you may look at me as you will, I loved Sarah Lewis; and, by all the gods, I love her now as I loved her then, and as I shall love her if I meet her again.

" Call it folly, call it boyish, call it an old man's whim, an old man's second childhood, I care not by what name you call it; it is enough that to-night the image of that young girl stands before me splendidly beautiful in all the holiness of her young glad life, and I could bow down on my knees and worship her now again.

" Why did I say again ? For forty years I have not ceased to worship her. If I kneel to pray in the morn- ing, she passes between me and God. If I would read the prayers at evening twilight, she looks up at me from the page. If I would worship on a Sabbath morning in the church, she looks down on me from some unfathom- able distance, some unapproachable height, and I pray to her as if she were my hope, my heaven.

" Sometimes in the winter nights I feel a coldness steal- ing over me, and icy fingers are feeling about my heart, as if to grasp and still it. I lie calmly, quietly, and I think my hour is at hand ; and through the gloom, and through the mists and films that gather over my vision, I see her afar off, still the same angel in the distant heaven, and I

278 I GO A- FISHING.

reach out my arms to her, and I cry aloud on God to let me go find her, and on her to come to me, and then thick darkness settles on me.

" The doctor calls this apoplexy, and says I shall some day die in a fit of it. What do doctors know of the tre- mendous influences that are working on our souls? He, in his scientific stupidity, calls it a disease, and warns me against wine and high living, as if I did not understand what it is, and why my vision at such times reaches so very far into the deep unknown.

" I have spoken of Tom Lewis, her cousin. Rumor said he was the old man's heir in equal proportion with the daughter ; for he had been brought up in the family, and had always been treated as a son. He was a good fellow, if he was rough, for he had the goodness that all who came within her influence must have.

" I have seen her look the devil out of him often. I remember once when the horses had behaved in a way not to suit him, and he had let an oath or two escape his lips preparatory to putting on the whip. We were riding together down the avenue, and he raised the lash. At the moment he caught her eye. She was walking up from the lodge, where she had been to see a sick child. She saw the raised whip, and her eye caught his. He did not strike. The horses escaped for that time. He drove them quietly through the gate, and three miles and back without a word of anger.

"Did I tell you I was her cousin also? A second cousin on her mother's side, not on the General's. We lived not far off, and I lived much of my time at his house. Tom and myself had been inseparable, and we did not conceal our rivalry from each other.

"'Tom,' said I, one morning, 'why can't you be con-

THE MAJORS STORY. 279

tent with half the General's fortune, and let me have the other half?'

" ' Bah ! Jerry,' said he, ' as if that would be any more even, when you want Sarah with it. In Heaven's name, take the half of the money, if that's all you want.'

" * Can't we fix it so as to make an even division, Tom ? Take all the fortune, and let me have her, and I'll call it square.'

" ' Just what I was going to propose to you. Be rea- sonable now, Jerry, and get out of the way. You must see she doesn't care a copper for you.'

" I twirled a rosebud in my fingers that she had given me that morning, and replied —

" ' Poor devil ! I did not think you could be so infatu- ated. Why, Tom, there is no chance for you under the sun. But go ahead ; find it out as you will. I'm sorry for you.'

" A hundred such talks we used to have, and she never gave either of us one particle more of encouragement than the other. She was like a sister to us both, and neither dared to break the spell of our perfect happiness by asking her to be more.

" And so time passed on.

" One summer afternoon we were ofT together on horse- back, all three of us, over the mountain and down the valley. We were returning toward sunset, sauntering along the road down the side of the hill.

" Philip, stir the fire a little. That bottle of claret is rather cold, it seems to me, or I am a little chilly my- self. Perhaps it is the recollection of that day that chills me.

" I had made up my mind, if opportunity occurred, to tell her that day all that I had thought for years. I had

28o I GO A- FISHING.

determined to know, once for all, if she would love me or no.

" If not, I would go, I cared not where ; the world was broad enough, and it should be to some place where I should never see her face again, never hear her voice again, never bow down and worship her magnificent beau- ty again. I would go to Russia and offer myself to the Czar, or to Syria and join the Druses, or to India, China, any where to fight. All my notions were military, I re- member, and all my ideas were of war and death on the field.

" I rode by her side, and looked up at her occasionally, and thought she was looking splendidly. I had never seen her more so. Every attitude was grace, every look was life and spirit.

" Tom clung close to her. One would have thought he was watching the very opportunity I was after myself. Now he rode a few paces forward, and as I was catching my breath to say ' Sarah,' he would rein up and fall back to his place, and I would make some flat remark that made me seem like a fool to myself, if not to her.

" ' What's the matter with you, Jerry ?' said she, at length.

" ' Jerry's in love,' said Tom.

" I could have thrashed him on the spot.

" ' In love ! Jerry in love !' and she turned her large brown eyes toward me.

" In vain I sought to fathom them, and arrive at some conclusion whether or no the subject interested her with special force.

" The eyes remained fixed, till I blundered out the old saw — ' Tom judges others by himself

" Then the eyes turned to Tom, and he pleaded guilty

THE major's story. 281

by his awkward looks, and half-blushes, and averted eyes, and forced laugh.

" ' By Heaven !' thought I, ' what would I not give for Tom's awkwardness now ! The scoundrel is winning his way by it'

" ' Jerry, is Tom in love ?'

" The 7idivete of the question, the correctness of it, the very simplicity of the thing was irresistible, and I could not repress a smile that grew into a broad laugh. Tom joined in it, and we made the woods ring with our mer- riment.

" ' I say, Tom, isn't that your whip lying back yonder in the road ?'

" ' Confound it, yes ; the cord has broken from my wrist;' and he rode back for it.

" * Jerry, whom does Tom love ?' said she, quickly, turn- ing to me.

"'You,' said I, bluntly.

" ' Why, of course ; but who is he in love with, I mean ?'

" It was a curious way to get at it. Could I be justi- fied .'' It was not asking what I had intended, but it was getting at it in another way, and just as well, perhaps. It was, at all events, asking Tom's question for him, and it saved me the embarrassment of putting it as my own. I determined this in an instant.

" ' Sarah, could you love Tom well enough to marry him ?'

" ' I ! Jerry; what do you mean ?'

" ' Suppose Tom w^ants you to be his wife, will you marry him ?'

" ' I don't know — I can't tell — I never thought of such a thing. You don't think he has any such idea, do you ?'

"That was my answer. It was enough as far as it

282 I GO A- FISHING.

went, but I was no better off than before. She did not love Tom, or she would never have answered thus. But did she love me ? Would she marry me ? Wouldn't she receive the idea in just the same way .^

" I looked back. Tom was on the ground, had picked up his whip, and had one foot in the stirrup, ready to mount again. I gulped down my heart that was up in my throat, and spoke out —

" ' Sarah, will you marry me V

"Philip, she turned her eyes again toward me — those large brown eyes, those holy eyes — and blessed me with their unutterably glorious gaze. To my dying hour I shall not forget that gaze ; to all eternity it will remain in my soul. She looked at me one look ; and whether it was pity, sorrow, surprise, or love, I can not tell you, that filled them and overflowed toward me from out their im- measurable depths; but, Philip, it was the last light of those eyes I ever saw — the last, the last.

" Is there any thing left in that bottle ? Thank you. Just a glassful. You wall not take any ? Then, by your leave, I will finish it. My story is nearly ended, and I will not keep you up much longer.

"We had not noticed, so absorbed had we been in our pleasant talk, that a black cloud had risen in the west and obscured the sun, and covered the entire sky; and even the sultry air had not called our attention to the coming thunder-storm.

" As she looked at me, even as she fixed her eyes on mine, a flash, blinding and fierce, fell on the top of a pine-tree by the road-side, not fifty yards from us, and the crash of the thunder shook the foundations of the hills.

"For a moment all was dazzling, burning, blazing

THE major's story. 283

light; then sight was gone, and a momentary darkness settled on our eyes. The horses crouched to the ground in terror, and Sarah bowed her head as if in the presence of God.

"All this was the work of an instant, and the next, Tom's horse sprang by us on a furious gallop, dragging Tom by the stirrup. He had been in the act of mount- ing when the flash came, and his horse swerved and jumped so that his foot caught, and he was dragged with his head on the ground.

" There was a point in the road, about fifty yards ahead, where it divided into two. The one was the car- riage-track, which wound down the mountain by easy de- scents ; the other was a foot-path, which was a short, pre- cipitous cut to a point on the carriage - road nearly a quarter of a mile below.

" Calling to Sarah to keep back and wait, I drove the spurs into my horse, and went down the steep path. Looking back, I saw her following, her horse making tre- mendous speed. She kept the carriage-road, following on after Tom, and I pressed on, thinking to intercept his horse below.

"The pace was terrible. I could hear them thunder- ing down the track above. I looked up and caught sight of them through the trees. I looked down, and saw a gully before me full eighteen feet wide and as many deep.

"A great horse was that black horse Caesar, and he took the gully at a flying leap that landed us far over it, and a moment later I was at the point where the roads again met, but only in time to see the other two horses go by at a furious pace, Sarah's abreast of the gray, and she reaching her hand out, bravely trying to grasp the flying rein, as her horse went leap for leap with him.

284 I GO A- FISHING.

" To ride close behind them was worse than useless in such a case. It would but serve to increase their speed; so I fell back a dozen rods and followed, watching the end.

" At the foot of the mountain the river ran, broad and deep, spanned by the bridge at the narrowest point. To reach the bridge, the road took a short turn up stream, directly on the bank.

" On swept the gray and the black horse, side by side, down the hill-side, not fifty leaps along the level ground, and then came the turn.

" She was on the off-side. At the sharp turrl she pressed ahead a half-length and reined her horse across the gray's shoulder, if possible to turn him up toward the bridge.

"It was all over in an instant. The gray was the heavier horse. He pressed her close; the black horse yielded, gave way toward the fence, stumbled, and the fence, a light rail, broke with a crash, and they went over, all together into the deep black stream.

" Still, still the sound of that crash and plunge is in my ears. Still I can see them go headlong down that bank together into the black water !

" I never knew exactly what I did then. When I was conscious I found myself swimming around in a circle, diving occasionally to find them, but in vain. The gray horse swam ashore and stood on the bank by my black, with distended nostrils and trembling limbs, shaking from head to foot with terror. The other black horse was floating down the surface of the stream, drowned. His mistress was nowhere visible, and Tom was gone also. " I found her at last. " Yes, she was dead !

THE major's story. 285

"Restore her? No. A glance at her face showed how vain all such hope was. Never was human face so angelic. She was already one of the saintly — one of the immortals — and the beauty and glory of her new life had left some faint likeness of itself on her dead form and face.

" I said I had never grown a day older since that time. You know now why. I have never ceased to think of her as on that day. I have never lost the blessing of those eyes as they looked on me in the forest on the mountain road. I have never left her, never grown away from her. If, in the resurrection, we are to resume the bodies most exactly fitted to represent our whole lives ; if, as I have sometimes thought, we shall rise in the forms we wore when some great event stamped our souls for- ever, then I am certain that I shall awake in form and feature as I was that day, and no memorial will remain of an hour of my life after her burial.

"We buried her in the old vault close by the house, among the oaks. Beautiful to the very last.

" My voice is broken. I can not talk any more. You have the story. That is the whole of it. God bless you, my boy. You have listened — patiently — to — my — talk.

" Good-night. Go to bed. I'll stay here in this chair awhile. I don't — exactly — feel — like — sleeping — just yet."

I left him sitting there ; his head bowed on his breast, his eyes closed, his breathing heavy. My own eyes were misty.

In the hall I found John, sitting bolt upright in a large chair.

"Why, John, I thought the Major sent you to bed long ago ?"

286 I GO A-FISHING.

"Yes, sir; the Major always sends me to bed at the third bottle, sir, and I always doesn't go. He's been a telling you the old story, now hasn't he, sir ?"

" What old story, John ?"

" Why, all about Miss Lewis, and Mister Tom, and the General ?"

"Yes."

John laid his long black finger knowingly up by the side of his nose, and looked at me.

" Why, John — you don't mean to say — eh .?"

" All the claret, sir .?"

" What ! Sarah and the black horse, and — "

"All claret, sir."

"John, my man, go in and take care of him. He is either asleep or drunk. Curious that ! Why didn't I think that a man was hardly to be believed after the sec- ond bottle, and perfectly incredible on the third. By Jove ! he is a trump at a story, though."

It would be difficult to describe all that I dreamed about that night.

XIV.

WHAT FLIES TO CAST ON A SUNDAY.

I HAVE passed a great deal of my life in forest sports, and I yield to no man in knowing how to enjoy them. And chiefest among the enjoyments of the forest I have found always the serenity of Sabbath rest. It comes to the wise sportsman with all the blessings that it brings to the weary laborer in the city, and with a thousand others; and he is unworthy to call himself a wise man who wets a line or puts cartridge in a rifle on Sunday in the forest.

For every man, whatsoever be his disposition, a calm day for thoughtful rest, for the repose of peaceful thinking, has its value. The Monday is fuller of enjoyment for that rest, and it is well, for one who doubts, to try it.

"What shall I do all day?" do you ask? Do, man? Think ! It won't harm you. Even if you have gone into the forest to escape from thought, you will find that Sun- day thinking may be full of calm and of balm. Set your- self at work to remember other Sundays in your life and how they passed. Mayhap you will find one, in all your memory, that is worth remembering. I can recall a hun- dred which I never want to forget.

I remember one, only last summer, that is pleasant and profitable to recall. We were at the Profile House, and, though there were about two hundred and fifty persons in the house, we had no clergyman among them. This

288 I GO A- FISHING.

does not often occur in the Profile House. As a general rule we have a service in the large drawing-room every Sunday morning. But on that day we were left to hear the sermons of the mountain winds. In the afternoon

my friend S and myself inquired about the church at

Franconia village, which is some five miles distant down the mountain, and were told that there would be a service at five o'clock. So we took Jack and the buggy and went down. (Did I ever tell you of Jack, and how Dupont and myself bought him some years ago in Northern New Hampshire, and have made all sorts of sporting expe- ditions with him, and what a horse of horses he is ? If not, perhaps I will tell you all that some day.) As we drove out of the mountain gorge and the forest the Sab- bath sunshine was making the earth to have somewhat of the hues of paradise. Far away, miles on miles of land slept in the golden light, and blue hills lifted their foreheads to God. Angels might love earth on such a day. Doubtless thus the land appeared to the Hebrew prophet when he saw it from Pisgah, exceeding beautiful ; and I sometimes wonder whether that vision was not given him but as the prevision of that which he was to see, when, turning away his longing gaze from the hills of Judah, he suddenly beheld the holier hills of God in the land which to him was no longer one of hope or promise. We reached the little Baptist church in Franconia in an hour or less. All was quiet around it, and we feared there was some mistake in our information. But the sound of a familiar hymn coming from the open door re- assured us, and leaving Jack to stand without a halter (for he resents the indignity of being fastened, hut never moves if you trust him to stand), we entered the little building. Instead of a regular service we found a prayer-

SUNDAY AT FRANCONIA. 289

meeting, but I think I never attended a religious meeting of any kind which was more impressive. A few men and women, the fairmers of the country, were assembled, and they seemed to be deeply impressed with sorrow that their numbers were so few, when there were enough of their neighbors to fill the church. The clergyman sat in a chair in the aisle, and conducted the service by an occa- sional remark and repeated requests that those present would pray. And pray they did, simply, fervently, and I doubt not effectually. You can not imagine the refresh- ing and calming character of such an afternoon service to one who has been for a long time past among less peace- ful scenes. As I sat down, I looked to the window and saw Mount Lafayette standing up still and solemn in the blue sky, like a giant waiting the will of a more gigantic master, and as they sang the old familiar hymn, I began to recall where I was just a year ago on that day. In the morning I heard mass in an ancient church where kings and kaisers and bishops and stout old knights of many old centuries were at rfest, heedless of the music of the organ, heedless of the thunders of war which were to burst on Germany within six hours. For at noon that day came the declaration of war, and in the afternoon I stood in a crowd of ten thousand Germans arming for the contest which was to rebuild the throne of Charlemagne and over- throw the throne of Napoleon. What a wild sweep of the tempest of human wrath did Europe feel in that one short year ! But then and there, in Franconia, what thought had the men and women of thrones or their changes ? To them the events of life are great which af- fect their own families, and the world is of small impor- tance. They should live near to God who live in quiet villages or farms among the mountains. And some of

T

290 I GO A-FISHING.

them do live very near to heaven. As I thought this the hymn was ended and a momentary silence ensued, and then an old man with snowy hair rose feebly and spoke in a broken voice. He said only this : That he had made up his mind to live more and more with his eye fixed on the glory to come. For, said he, " I am old and child- less ; I have lived eighty-five, and going on to eighty-six years. I am a great deal alone in the fields at my work, and I think all the time of the glorious home which I know I shall go to. Oh that home ! My old wife said to me when she went away last year, ' It is a glorious home we will have together there, and you will soon come to me, and we shall be together forever !' " And the old man's voice broke down entirely when he came to speak of this his great loss, but even as his voice faltered I could see a light in his old eye that told me he saw, right through the window of the little church, over the lofty summit of Lafayette, in the blue distance of that sky, the glory of which he had spoken, and the home in which she had promised to wait for him. Thank God they will be young again together there, and neither the simple imag- ination of the Franconia farmer nor the dweller all his life in palaces can begin to picture the peace which will there be after the storm of this life. And then, when the old man ceased to speak and there was silence for a moment in the little assembly, suddenly and very sweetly a wom- an's voice, clear and pure and strong, floated over our heads as she sang the refrain, "When I've been there ten thousand years." I looked up and saw her face — that of a Franconia girl, or young wife — clear-cut features, fair complexion, with a speaking eye now fixed in an upward look as she sang. She would be astonished doubtless if she knew the fancy that possessed me at that moment.

THE LITTLE CHURCH. 29 1

but I will tell what it was. Do you remember — per- haps you don't, for I have forgotten myself— who painted that St. Cecilia seated at the organ, which I used to ad- mire so much in Florence, but her face was the very face of that picture, and I would have given much for a photograph of it that instant as she looked up and sang. And then all the people sang, as I have not heard for years, and while they sang the old sad years went over me in a deep strong wave, and I was in the company of the dear ones of old times, never to come back again — never — never. How many are gone to God with whom we used to sing hymns in the Sabbath evenings ! And so it has come to pass that hymns which we then loved as full of hope and cheer are now inexpressibly sad, and we almost weep to hear them.

Then one and another and another of the little assem- bly prayed, and we came out into the last of the sunlight, and the land was lying blessed by it, beautiful beyond de- scription. And then we drove up the mountains, looking all the while up to their lofty tops as we ascended, and the light became purple and gold on the hills, like the robes of Solomon.

And I looked at Lafayette and saw the gorge of the White Cross, down which the water in summer pours into the brook which joins the outlet of Echo Lake, and this brook in the gorge looked like a mountain path going right up to the summit. All the way I had my eyes on that path, and followed up it the slow footsteps of one who was ascending the hill of life, and who at last reached the top and went on into the blue above.

The forest opened before us as we ascended, and at length we entered the gloom. But the last rays of the sun were shining through the trees, and here and there a

292 I GO A- FISHING.

tall trunk was lit like a great tree of gold. The squirrels were out for a last run before night, and occasionally along the road a chipmunk was sitting up wiping his whiskers with his forepaws, undisturbed by our approach, nor moving as we passed within a few feet of him. The voices of the birds filled the woods. I don't know what bird it is, but there is one who utters only one long, clear, musical whistle, broken by one or two pauses. So we

drove on through the forest, and and myself talked

of drives we took together the year previous in Switzer- land and Germany, and how together we saw the fires of hell surrounding the old cathedral of Strasbourg, and awoke in the night to hear the thunder of the bombard- ment; and so at last we came out of the woods at Echo Lake, and John, the Indian, stopped us to tell me of a large trout that had been breaking near the boat-house, as they generally do of a Sunday, and then we drove on to the house, and were suddenly in the crowd of fashion and splendor at the Profile.

That was a Sunday worth remembering, according to my notion. Take my advice and let the trout alone on a Sunday, and become fishers of thought, drawing bright and good things out of the depths of mernory. They will rise to your cast with great freedom, and take hold strong- ly, and it is a pleasure to land them, and once secured they become an enjoyable possession forever.

I venture another bit of advice, based on some experi- ence as angler and traveler. I commend this rule for the Sunday : To worship God with his people, if there be ac- cessible to you any where a church calling itself Chris- tian, of whatever denomination. It is a good plan, and will be found remunerative. I have knelt on many a Sunday morning with Greeks, with Copts, with Armenians,

MONTE CASINO. 293

with Romans, and I can't say that it ever interfered with the sense of devotion, the act of adoration, the confidence in the presence of the Divine Master, that I was kneehng among those who did not believe precisely as I did. When the Ethiopian asked Philip what hindered that he should be accepted in the visible church by baptism, Philip told him it was a question of belief, and he replied, " I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God," and on the instant Philip stopped the chariot, baptized him, and disappeared. It's a short and mighty story that, which polemic theologians in all the churches would do well to study. Enough for me, an ignorant layman, to be con- tent to worship with those who believe as much as the Ethiopian believed, call themselves or be called by what name they may.

The memory of Sundays gone is the angler's best Sun- day company when he is alone in the forest. Let me re- call another such memory.

Away up in the heart of Italy, on the interior road from Naples to Rome, among hills and valleys that are beauti- ful in their vine-clad splendor, rises a strange sugar-loaf hill four hundred feet or so high, known to fame as Monte Casino. Its summit is covered with a vast mass of build- ings, presenting to the eye from below the appearance of a small fortified city. The approach to it is by a road which winds in a zigzag line up the almost perpendicular side of the hill, making a dozen or twenty sharp angles, back and forth, before it ends in the low archway through the massive walls which admits one who has accomplished the difficult ascent into the great monastery of the Bene- dictines. For this is the possession of that wealthy and once powerful order of monks, and is to this day the most splendid of the religious houses of Europe.

294 I GO A-FISHING.

When I was last in Italy we passed through the valley by rail, and saw the great pile of the monastery at a dis- tance. Years ago, when there were no rails in Italy, I drove one Saturday night into the little village of San Germano, where was a miserable inn, but in which Franz, my German servant, made us comfortable. For Franz was valet, cook, purveyor, a host in himself, who, though but a servant, looked down on couriers, and was worth any dozen of them condensed into one.

On Sunday morning, though a tempest was blowing, I climbed the hill to the monastery in time for the early mass. And after it was over I remained alone in the gorgeous chapel, occupied more with recalling the mighty faith of the great old Benedictines than with looking at the splendor which surrounded me.

I have seen a great many fine buildings, many grand ruins, but I know of no place where I was more impressed with the grandeur of every thing than in this old pile. Perhaps it was because of my respect for the order whose wealth had constructed it ; for among the folios on my library shelves there is no series of volumes that have given me more employment and enjoyment than those grand old Acta, the Deeds of the Order of St. Benedict.

Let me remind you, if you have perchance forgotten it, of the majesty of that great order. Founded in early times by the distinguished priest whose name it bears, it enrolled in its ranks the most illustrious men of a thou- sand years. They were the instructors of all the youth for centuries. They preserved for us all the great treas- ures of ancient classics by their diligent and laborious copying. From them sprang the Cistercians, the Carthu- sians, the Monks of St. Bernard, the Trappists, and a dozen other orders, all branches of the order of St. Bene-

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diet. More than twenty popes, over fifteen thousand bish- ops, and nearly fifty thousand of the canonized saints of the Roman Church, including the great St. Bernard, and many like him, came from the Benedictines.

From this brief summary of their history, you may be- lieve me when I say that they have in former years swayed the destinies of the world, the men who began life in these quiet cells, or walking this ancient court. Some have worn the coat of mail under the monk's gown, and swinging swords with strong right arms have done great service for the Cross and Church on hard-fought fields. Some have gone on long travel into distant lands, un- armed, without shoes or scrip, valiantly bearing the sacred symbol into heathen countries, with no protection but its own mission of peace and love. They succored the poor, they supported the fainting, they shrived the dying. They received princes in their arms at birth, and baptized them for the struggles of life ; they leaned above dying old monarchs, and anointed them for the slumber of universal equality. They were popes, cardinals, bishops, priests, monks, and martyrs. There was no land into which they did not penetrate, no nation whose language they did not speak, no palace too magnificent to receive them, no hut so lowly that they shrank from entering it with the mis- sion of Christ.

I honor the history of devoted men in every church ; and he is worse than a heathen who refuses to recognize that which is Christ-like in humanity, whether under a Dominican cowl, the gown of a Lutheran, or the bonnet of a Covenanter.

The monastery is vast in extent, but now peopled with only thirty or forty monks. It has been spared by the Italian government, which has broken up other monas-

296 I GO A -FISHING.

teries in Italy, its age and historical importance having preserved it from secularization. The chapel or church is without exception the most gorgeous interior in Europe or the world. I am astonished that it has escaped the eyes of so many travelers. The surface of all the walls, columns, and in short the entire interior, except the pave- ment, is one mass of unbroken Florentine mosaic. The Sicilian jaspers, carnelians, and agates are distributed with splendid effect. The columns supporting the architrave are of white marble, but there is no white marble visible, except a wreath of roses ascending spirally, which is carved in relief All the rest of the column is covered with jas- per and splendid stones in exquisite mosaic, around which the white wreath seems to be entwined.

"As I stood there a Benedictine brother approached me, and, when he found that I had some interest in the his- tory of the order as well as in the building, entered into conversation, and after a while said, " I will send for the organist, and we will have some music."

The organ ranks with those at Palermo and Haarlem. It is in Italy placed second in the world, that at Palermo being first. I sat down on a pedestal of one of the col- umns— there was no other seat — and Fra Bartolomeo (not he of ancient fame with the pencil, but certainly a rival in producing all the effects of beauty from sound that his great namesake did for the sight) came from a side-door, bowed slightly, with a sad kind of smile on his pale face, and disappeared behind the high altar where stood the organ. All was now silent except the roar of a mighty wind that was sweeping over the mountain-top. I sat and listened, and a solemn awe stole over me as I began to remember the knees that had pressed this pavement, the forms that had moved here in gown and cowl, all carried

THE GREAT ORGAN. 297

away on the winds of century after century. Then stole out on the air a low, sad, thrilling note which struggled at first as if it was an unearthly voice endeavoring to catch the key-note of our suffering nature. It sobbed, and broke, and wailed mournfully a little while, and then it rose and swelled, until it caught the voice of the wind that was thundering over the mountain-top, and like a cataract let loose it sprang into unison with the tempest. Then the story began. It was not Fra Bartolomeo that did it, at least that thought never entered my mind; it was the spirit of the splendid instrument, shut up I know not how many years in the old chapel, that now began to recite the story of the monks of St. Benedict. One died in prison, and the clanging doors made discord with his miserere; one perished on the battle-field, and the rush of armed hosts, the tread of horses, fierce battle-cries, chok- ing death-gasps and shrieks of agony mingled with the solemn nimc dwiiitis. One sank in the ocean, and the waves dashed over rocks as the story of his death was re- cited. One died in the arms of his mother, and her voice, intensely human and womanly, wailed over him. Then the history rose to greater themes, as men measure greatness, and I heard of kings and priests in many lands who had honored the order, and their national hymns, one after another, shook the walls of the gorgeous church. I can give no idea of the power of this instrument. Every ordinary wind and stringed instrument was imi- tated with perfection ; and the human voice, in solo or in chorus, seemed to be a part of the organ. For just one hour I sat in silence, awed, astonished, nay, astounded, by a power I had never dreamed of before. Then it ceased, and in the silence Fra Bartolomeo glided noise- lessly across the church, pale, slender, with the same sad

298 I GO A -FISHING.

smile on his face as he bowed and disappeared toward the cloisters.

Many a time, in the northern forests, of a Sunday even- ing when the wind is high among the pines, I hear the sound of the organ at Monte Casino.

As I write that sentence it occurs to me that some reader, not familiar with forest life, may regard it as a pure imagination when one says that the sound of the wind is like distant music. But it is no imagination. In our city lives we are, without knowing it, in a constant noise. There is no moment of day or night in New York when the air is not vibrating with sound. The innumer- able occupations of men, the wheels on pavements, the very voices of many thousands in ordinary conversation, keep up a constant disturbance of the atmosphere, so that what we call silence in the city, or stillness, is only com- parative. A good illustration of this is found when one goes out of town by rail, carrying with him the city noise in the roar of the train, until he is set down at a country station, and the engine drags away the last of the sounds of the town, leaving him on the platform in the country stillness. The ear is at rest for the first time in weeks or months, and the silence is wonderful.

For this reason in town we do not often notice the pe- culiar tones of the wind, although sometimes they are re- markable enough as the air is broken into vibrations by chimneys and the corners of window-casings. The voices of the wind are so various in the forest that, notwithstand- ing all which has been written of them, I am persuaded the thousandth part has not been told of their wonderful power, ^olian notes are the subject of innumerable poems, and no one has written of the country without reference to them. But it is not alone in melody and

THE SOUND OF BELLS. 299

music that the wind gives its utterances. There is scarce- ly a sound that ear of man has heard which is not im- itated in the forest, by day or by night. The thunder of waterfalls, the roar of cars over city pavements, the clatter of machinery, the rattling fire of distant musketry, the tramp of men on the march, singly, in squads, in masses, the shouts of mobs, the huzzas of political meetings, the low hum of conversation, the tones of single voices speak- ing slowly, the prattle of children, the wails of sickness and suffering, the far-off shout of a well-known voice — these are but a few of the innumerable sounds which are to be heard in the forest when the wind rises or falls.

Every one has heard of the strange sound which travel- ers on the Eastern deserts report, the sound of church- bells pealing over the lonesome sands. I heard that sound once on the Arabian desert, and have described it elsewhere. I heard it once in an American forest. I awoke at midnight from deep sleep and lay awake listen- ing to the wind, when suddenly the bells began to sound. It was as if six or eight heavy bells were ringing at a dis- tance, precisely as the fire-bells of New York sometimes sound to one on a vessel in the lower bay. Sleeping by my side was one who had heard the same sound with me on the desert. I heard it for full ten minutes, then sat up to listen, and my movement woke the sleeper.

"What is the matter?"

" Nothing. Only listen and tell me what you hear."

" I hear the bells !"

Clearly there was no mistake of imagination about it, and we heard them for some minutes longer, until they died away in the louder rush of the wind among the branches of the trees that were close above us.

The vibrations of the air which produce certain sounds

300 I GO A -FISHING.

may be excited by various causes, and it is not strange that the wind, finding its way over rocks and sand-hills or among the myriad leaves and branches of a forest, should fall occasionally into vibrations such as bells or human voices excite. Hence it is not mere imagination which hears familiar tones in the wind.

XV.

IN NORTHERN NEW HAMPSHIRE.

Trout abound in the northern portions of the Middle States and throughout New England, but of course are disappearing rapidly from the more accessible waters. It is quite out of the question to answer that often-re- peated inquiry of the lover of angling whom business keeps in town, "Where can I find trout-fishing without going far away ?"

There are streams within a half- day's ride of New York in which there are still many trout, and where an- gling is free to all. But as the habits of the trout are somewhat uncertain, it is by no means a sure thing to go for a single day to such a stream with the anticipation of much sport.

The northern parts of New Hampshire and Maine, and the eastern parts of Canada, with New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, afford doubtless the best trout-fishing in America or in the world, with perhaps the exception of our Rocky Mountain and other far-western regions, where trout abound as they did a few years ago in Maine. It has been elsewhere stated in this volume that the brook trout grows to a much larger size in the waters of Maine than any where else, so far as our present knowl- edge extends. In Rangely Lake and the waters flowing from it we have taken many speckled trout weighing

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eight and nine pounds. I have entire confidence in the evidence afforded me there some years ago, by lumber- men whom I knew, that two brook trout have been taken near Indian Rock weighing eleven pounds each. Read- ers of newspapers must bear in mind when they meet with stories of large trout, that there are several varieties of the family, and that the lake trout grows to an enor- mous size in some waters. But it is safe to believe for the present that no one has seen a brook trout, or speck- led trout (with red and gold spots), the Salmo fontinalis of the books, exceeding the weight of those taken in Maine, in the head waters of the Androscoggin. This chain of lakes, Rangely, Moosetocmaguntic, or Mooseluckmagun- tic, Wellokenebacook, Mollichunkamunk, Richardson (dif- ferent names which have been given sometimes to the same lake, and sometimes to parts of a lake), pours a strong river into Umbagog, and from this flows the An- droscoggin. The Magalloway River comes down from the north and joins the Androscoggin two miles below Umbagog. All the smaller lakes and streams which flow into these waters abound in trout. The Maine wa- ters have been visited of late by so many anglers, and so much has been written about them, that they are well known. Not so the Magalloway waters. But the time is not far distant when all this country will be familiar to lovers of the angle, and after them will come the lovers of scenery, and the lonesome places will be peopled, at least in the summer season.

We made up a party at the Profile House to drive through Northern New Hampshire.

The Mountain Ranger is a coach of coaches. It has four seats inside, together capable of holding twelve per- sons, and two seats in front by the driver. Thus it will

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carry ordinarily fourteen persons, with their baggage, and the baggage customary among White Mountain travelers is heavier than it ought to be. Our party consisted of five gentlemen with their wives, and our baggage was light. We were therefore very comfortable in this long coach with six horses. Before we left the Profile House we made out a list of necessaries of life, without which civilized ladies would inevitably perish, and for these we sent to New York.

Every man should understand a rule of travel as well as of going a-fishing, which is, that if ladies are of the party (and they may almost always be), they must be made comfortable. Gentlemen can " rough it," but ladies should never be allowed to rough it if there are means of transportation.

There is nothing more absurd and unreasonable than the growling which some men make about the quantity of ladies' baggage. When you have ladies in charge, take every luxury that they may require. It is as easy to take care of ten trunks as two, and the secret of pleas- ant travel is to avoid as far as possible all that can be called " roughing it," by having in the luggage every pos- sible comfort. In this way invalid ladies may travel with ease and benefit Many travelers of both sexes suf- fer in health from exposures which would have been wholly unnecessary had they taken a proper amount of luggage. Men do not handle their own trunks in this age of the world, and there are always and every where plenty of porters glad to handle them. Are you crossing the desert with your wife ? Add an extra camel or two to your train, and carry trunks full of articles that you may just by a bare possibility find convenient. Is economy an object with you.? Then do not take a lady where she

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must be without comforts, unless she is thoroughly strong, and able to endure as much as yourself. But don't growl about luggage. It is one of the most stupid fashions of the times. Carry your household goods and gods with you if you want them, and pay for them like a man.

We did not know that we should have any rough times, and, as it proved, we did not have any ; but we enjoyed ourselves none the less for the provisions ordered in New York, and, thanks to the express system, we found them at Littleton awaiting us when we met there. I had gone to Littleton on Tuesday, having an engagement to fish a certain pond fifteen miles from that place, which I fulfilled, taking no fish, on Wednesday. On Thursday morning the Mountain Ranger was at the door, the baggage and stores were loaded, and at ten o'clock we were off for the un- known regions of the North. From Littleton to Lancas- ter was a short day's ride. We discovered nothing re- markable along the road except a hotel, beautifully situ- ated on the bank of the Connecticut at Dalton. It looked like a pleasant and quiet place to do summer loitering. They said pickerel fishing was good thereabouts, but trout were not common. There was a large hotel in Lancas- ter, which is a pleasant village. We strolled up the bank of Israel's River in the evening, and made a few casts above and below the paper-mill dam. Chubs rose to the fly, but no trout. • Evening came down very placidly in this delicious valley. The Baron was out sketching till dark, and found other artists in fields and forests around. They frequent the place, and there is no better evidence of its beauty of situation. Since the days of which I write the rail has been extended from Littleton, through Lancaster, to Northumberland. In the morning we drove on to Northumberland station, on the Grand Trunk Rail-

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305

way, and, as our road thence lay for twelve miles parallel to the rails, we relieved the horses by taking a convenient train just then coming along, and waited for the Mount- ain Ranger again at North Stratford station. Some fish- ermen had been drawing a seine in the Connecticut just as we arrived, and we saw the product of the haul. It was a few bushels of fish that in my boy days we used to call wind -fish, and some large suckers. Nothing else. But I have taken large trout in the Connecticut at this spot. I recall one evening when I was detained there, and went over to the Vermont side of the river with a fly- rod, and killed four noble fish at the mouth of a mill- stream that pours into the Connecticut below the bridge. A little of the old camp experience came into play here, and Dupont and myself distinguished ourselves by get- ting dinner ready. On the whole it was a success, and the coffee was superb. The evening ride of thirteen miles to Colebrook was fine. The roads in this part of the country are excellent, and the scenery varied and always beautiful. There are two Monadnocks in New England. I don't know which is the original, but that one which looks down on Colebrook is a fine old hill, and viewed from the front of the inn on a Sunday evening, when one bright star rests like a beacon on its summit, it is very grand.

We were to rest here over Saturday and Sunday, for, as we were going into unknown regions, it was not safe to arrive on Saturday night with ladies on the east side of Dixville Notch, where it was quite uncertain whether

we should find even a house. St. A and the Baron

agreed to drive through the Notch on Saturday and ex- plore, and Dupont and I began to inquire about the fish- ing. We had a dozen streams and lakes placed at our

3o6 I GO A- FISHING.

service. But we had heard mention of Diamond Pond, and our longings were thitherward. It was variously stated at ten to fifteen miles' distance, by a road which led through the wildest section of the country. So we arranged for horses and a guide, and began in the even- ing to unpack our fishing tackle. It was amusing to see the expressions of countenance, and hear the brief and sententious remarks made in the bar-room when our light Norris rods were brought to the view of the Colebrook fishermen. For they were anglers, and not to be despised let me tell you. What American angler, however skilled in the later years of his life, dare think without respect of the up-country fisher who taught him his first cast with an ash pole and a brown cock's hackle ? There is much written and much said about the superiority, now of fine tackle, now of birch and hemp. The accomplished angler, with slender rod, multiplying reel, silk line, and thorough- ly assorted book of flies, is sometimes indignant at the remark that a barefooted boy with pole and line and worm can catch more trout than he. It is sometimes true. Along a stream where trout are plenty, the short rod and worm bait will kill them much more rapidly than a slender rod and a landing-net. But the angler does not always seek many fish, and the difference is in the pleasure of the skillful sport on the one hand, and the rapidity of filling a basket on the other. Nevertheless, as I have clearly stated before, I am not one of the class of anglers who despise bait-fishing even for trout, and when I want them in quantity for any purpose, I use whichever I find to be the most taking lure. I can see the scornful smile of some of my readers at this avowal. Be as scornful as you please. It is to my notion the ex- treme of nonsense for modern fishermen to read old Izaak

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307

out of the society of anglers because he fished with bait. Izaak was wise in his generation, and among the wisest of his doings was this same act of sagacity as a sports- man— using bait when the fish would not take a fly. But I wander, and return to the subject, only adding that deli- cate tackle will sometimes take more and larger fish than homely rods and lines, and Diamond Pond itself shall prove the proposition.

They said our Norris rods would not lift a trout to the surface, much less out of water. They forgot, as most people do, that a dead fish is little if at all heavier than water, and does not need lifting to the top. The mys- teries of a landing-net are seldom understood by those who are accustomed to throw their fish over their heads on the end of a short line and long stiff rod. " But your rods are too short. You can not throw your fly far enough. If you fish Diamond Pond you must have a rod fifteen feet long, and a line twelve feet at least. The trout are very shy there." Reply : " We can throw a fly seventy-five feet with these rods." Rejoinder: incredulous smiles, and a murmur in the corner of the room that they are " not so green in Colebrook" as we seemed to imagine.

The morning of Saturday was by all odds the most glo- rious morning on record. It was a day of days. Such a sky! such sunshine ! such rich, cool atmosphere ! Our guide failed us at the start, and two hours' delay ensued. A volunteer was gladly accepted. He was a gentleman who was seeking health by a long stay at Colebrook. He had been frequently at Diamond Pond, and knew all about it. He proved the best of company, and the horses went like the wind under his handling of the ribbons. I don't think horses ever did better work. It was fifteen miles if it was a rod, and we did it in an hour and three quar-

308 I GO A- FISHING.

ters, up hill and down, through forest, passing fine farms, then new frame houses, then log huts, and at last pulling up short at the end of the road by a small cottage and a barn, wherein we placed the steeds for rest and refresh- ment.

In later years Dupont and and I have made

that little house a fishing home, and have seen there such days of long delight and starry evenings, full of all man- ner of joyousness, as I shall never know again.

A half-mile walk, through a primeval forest, brought us to the bank of the lake. Look again at your map of New Hampshire, if you have one, and note the locality. You will not find the lake laid down. There are a hundred lakes hereabouts which are unknown to the map-makers. It is possible, however, that you may find the head of the Androscoggin River flowing west out of Lake Umbagog, and receiving the Magalloway River before it bends south- ward. Now go up the Magalloway ten miles, and you will find the Diamond River coming into it from the west. Diamond River flows from Great Diamond Lake, which receives by a short stream the waters of Little Diamond, on whose bank we stood. It is nearly round, not much over a thousand feet in diameter, surrounded by forest. The bank is nowhere accessible for casting a fly. There was one old boat on it, a wood-cutter's scow, which should have been found at the spot where we pushed through the low brush to the water's edge. But it was missing. A few shouts brought a response, and at length the boat came in sight, paddled by one man and holding three others, who had been in camp across the lake for several days. The boatman was a Frenchman, who lived in one of the log huts we had passed, and who, on learning that we wanted the boat, exhibited a common phase of human

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nature, by showing us his rough side first. He was going back to ferry over the baggage from the camp, and then was going to use the boat himself for a few hours' fish- ing. It was already noon, and the prospect was poor ; the Frenchman was surly and pushed off. While he was gone the camping party assured us that we would get no trout, for various reasons, chiefly that they had got none for two days, that the water was very clear, the sunshine very bright, the breeze had gone and there was no ripple, and finally, when they saw the light rods, they stopped explaining and simply laughed at us. So did the French- man when he came back with the luggage, and when a couple of dollars had civilized and converted him from a foe into a friend.

" I'll paddle you about myself. I know all about the lake, but you'll get no fish with those rods here." " Why not ?"

" Because you can't get near enough to the trout." " We'll see."

So out we pushed on the glassy surface of the Diamond in a broad noon sunshine. A poor prospect for trout, and it must be confessed that every one we had seen since our arrival at Colebrook had agreed with every one else that we were not to take any.

The old boat was wet and dirty. I cut plenty of pine boughs and filled her up, threw myself down on them, and luxuriated in the sun and air as we went around the edge of the lake, impelled by the noiseless paddle of the skill- ful Frenchman, who proved a first-rate fellow. I was idle, and Dupont sat gravely looking at the glassy surface, doubting much whether it was worth his while to exercise his wrist. We saw no break on the surface any where. The Frenchman and our Colebrook friend were regretting

3IO I GO A-FISHING.

that we had not brought long rods, and protesting that it would be a waste of time to remain on the lake. " I have seen fine trout rise inshore there," said the Frenchman, as we passed a sort of cove, a rock rising between us and it some twenty or thirty feet off. Dupont, without rising, prepared for his first cast. A few swift swings of the rod while he reeled off the required length, and seventy feet of gray silk line was in the air, then a short twist of the wrist and the little red ibis fly touched the water, away beyond the rock in the middle of the cove, full five rods distant. Nor had it touched the surface before there was a sharp rush and plunge over it, and my friend quietly said, " I have him." The look of the Frenchman was in- finitely ludicrous. When he saw the line gathering in the air for the cast, he forgot his paddle ; when the fly went into the cove, he stood up with open mouth ; when Du- pont said, "I have him," he gulped out, "What! a trout?" and when he saw the little Norris rod bend to the pull, and after a short struggle bring alongside a pound trout, which with the aid of the landing-net soon lay at his feet, his expressions of astonishment knew no bounds. I was so thoroughly occupied in watching his countenance and enjoying the surprise as well of our Colebrook friend, that for a full half-hour I lay in the end of the boat without making a cast. Dupont meantime landed a dozen fine trout, and threw back some which were too small for such company. When I commenced to work, we had an illus- tration of the curious luck of fishermen. Our rods, lines, leaders, and flies were precisely alike, and we cast within six feet of each other, but nothing would rise to me, while he took fine fish. For more than an hour I did not have one rise, while he was taking plenty. Then suddenly, for no cause that I can explain, my luck changed, and I had

DIAMOND POND. 3II

as many fish as I could handle. When the sun went to the westward, and the shadows of the trees began to creep out over the water, we moved up to the head of the lake, where the water was not two feet deep, and grass grew from the bottom in abundance. Here at every cast we had fine fish, often two at a time, and once three on one leader. The general run of the trout which we took in this lake would average something less than a pound. Only one I think went above a pound and a half.

Here was a case for the consideration of all theoretical anglers. It was a clear,, sunshiny, still day, with a cool air from the northwest, the previous day having been hot. There was an occasional ripple on the surface, but in the main it was glassy. The best fly was the scarlet ibis, proved by the fact that with three flies on each leader we took three trout on the ibis to one on any other fly.

We left the lake at half-past four, mindful of a long drive over a wild mountain road, good in the track, but narrow and bordered by rocks and ravines. I have for- gotten the number of trout taken, but according to the best of my recollection it was upward of fifty, all fine in size and quality. Along the road home our Colebrook friend chanted the praises of delicate tackle, and in the evening the crowd in the hotel bar-room looked with won- derment at the catch, and examined the rods and lines and flies alternately, and listened to the marvelous ac- counts of our companion, who clinched his stories with the bold assertion that "while we were coasting down the north side of the lake, those two gentlemen were throwing their flies into the shadows on the south side and pulling great trout clear across the pond."

On Sunday we rested quietly, attending the morning service at a little village church.

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On Monday morning, having a favorable report from our explorers, we pushed on for Dixville Notch. The roads are good in all this part of New Hampshire. Our route lay up the Mohawk River, which, flowing from the Notch and receiving other streams, empties into the Con- necticut at Colebrook. As we rode along we noted that trout were rising in the pools visible from the road. It is doubtless a stream well worth fishing.

At length we began to ascend toward the Notch. The forest closed in. The trees not only met above the road, but they fairly closed the road with long, slender, leaf- covered branches, so that the carriage sailed through a sea of leaves, parting them on either side as a boat parts the water. Thus for two miles, when suddenly we came out of the thicket and found ourselves at the gate of the Notch.

It is one of the wildest and most imposing pieces of rock and mountain scenery on the Atlantic side of our country. Totally different from, and therefore not to be compared with any of the passes among the White Mount- ains, it has peculiar characteristics which are not equaled elsewhere. In general it may be said that the Notch looks as if it had been produced by a convulsion of nature, which broke the mountain ridge from underneath, throw- ing the strata of rocks up into the air, and letting them fall in all directions. The result is that the lines of strat- ification in the solid part of the hills point upward, some- times nearly perpendicularly, and several pinnacles of rock, like the falling spires of cathedrals, stand out against the sky. On Saturday the Baron had made the ascent of one of these pinnacles or spires, and came near being converted into a St. Simeon Stylites, for the rock crumbled behind him, and left him no visible way of re-

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turn after he had reached the lofty summit. With phil- osophic calmness, however, he sketched the scene from that point, perhaps intending to throw it down to St.

A as his farewell work; but having finished his

sketch, he accomplished a descent which was perilous in the extreme, and which indeed to our eyes on Monday seemed incredible.

Up the wild pass the Mountain Ranger pressed. The road was now the solid rock. The vast walls closed in on each side of us. A few hundred feet up the steep hill brought us to the summit of the pass, and the carriage stood still across the point of rock. It was a little past twelve o'clock noon, and the sun was behind the very peak of the precipice which towered some five hundred feet above us. A cold wind rushed and roared through the Notch. Its sounds were curious, sometimes almost human, as if there were inhabitants of this weird pass who were angry at our invasion. The marked characteristic of all the view was the worn-out, used-up appearance of every thing. The rocks were all decayed and crumbling; the mosses were brown and dry ; the bushes were little, old weazen-faced bushes ; the very sky seemed brown or brassy overhead.

It is a very remarkable, a wonderful piece of scenery, and taking in connection with this the various views along the road, I have no hesitation in saying that the drive from Colebrook, through Dixville Notch to Bethel, is the finest drive I have ever found in America. I remark in passing that any ordinarily strong wagon, carriage, or buggy will go safely enough through this road. No one should think of attempting to travel in New Hampshire with a light-built city carriage.

AVe walked down the sudden plunge of the road east-

314 I GO A-FISHING.

ward from the summit, and soon reached the Cold Spring. It is verily cold. A mere trickling, drop by drop, of water ; but I think a thermometer would show it to be as low as 40, and possibly lower.

If any one ask you whence the name Dixville Notch, there is no better reason to give than this, to wit, that once a party of ten persons from New York, a gay and joyous party, full of enjoyment, forgot here for a while the outer world and made this the city of their habitation ; for where one eats one inhabits. And did we not eat there? In the eastern part of the pass near the road on the left is a flume, a gorge of the rocks through which a crystal stream leaps babbling as streams are wont. We rested there, and the horses ate their provender while we lunched. It was a group which might well have given a name to the place, that picturesque assemblage under the old trees by the road-side. We had intended to bake some trout, but languor and laziness came on us, and we sat down on the soft pine leaves and drank in the deliciousness of "doing nothing."

An hour, two hours passed swiftly by, and we again commenced the journey. The road was fine, and we rattled along rapidly through the forest, following the descent of a swift and increasing brook, which rises in the Notch, is called Clear Stream, and empties into the Androscoggin a mile below Errol Dam. The road after some twelve miles of forest emerged on farming lands, and at length crossed the Androscoggin by a covered bridge. We did not cross, but turned short to the left up the river, and again into the woods.

The sun was setting beyond the Dixville Hills when we emerged from the forest at Errol Dam, and our six-horse team, not a bit wearied with the journey through the pass,

ERROL DAM.

315

dashed up a slight ascent to the door of a neat frame house standing a hundred feet or so above the river. The Androscoggin, leaving Lake Umbagog some six miles above this spot, flows sluggishly in a black, deep stream to this, its first obstruction. The river is here nearly two hundred feet broad. The dam, being intended solely for timber purposes, is a fine structure, with six sluice-ways through which logs can be passed down. In the running season they are here counted and the toll imposed. The sloping log-ways through the dam are about a hundred feet in length, heavily timbered, with gates at the upper end, which may be entirely closed. The river above the dam is broad, smooth, and flowing gently, with a scarcely perceptible current ; but as it ap- proaches the dam the black surface bends suddenly down- ward with a graceful curve, and the water rushes head- long into the sluice-ways, which it enters some thirty or forty feet below this curve in the surface. On the north side of the river, near the dam, stood the house of which I have spoken. Originally this was designed solely as a place of residence for the lumbermen engaged in work, but the proprietors had added a front building to the old cottage, and our surprise was great when on entering it we found an abundance of clean, neat rooms, simply but beau- tifully furnished, and the whole establishment better in ap- pearance than nine out of ten of the large hotels in our cities. Evening was at hand, and the roar of the river was in- viting. Dupont and myself hastened to unpack our tackle, and went down to the water to try a few casts in the twi- light. The deep basin at the foot of the dam presented the most flattering prospect for trout, and we whipped it for some time, but without a rise. Then we essayed the black water above the dam with equally poor success.

3l6 I GO A- FISHING.

Then we went down to a vast timber-jam, which covered the entire river and hid its surface for a half-mile below. We tried various openings in this, but although chubs rose in abundance we saw no fin of a trout. It was discour- aging, and when it became profoundly dark we went back to the house in poor spirits, and began to talk of return- ing to Diamond Pond.

The evening in the house was cheery. We gathered around a blazing fire in the little parlor, and made merry over our position. As the hours wore on we heard a sound of singing in the other end of the house, and at length the swell of clear, strong voices came in, chant- ing old sacred tunes. St. A had found the group of

lumbermen, and tested their musical abilities to good ef- fect. They made the night, now light with the moon, ring with the grand old songs which, however rudely sung, if but with spirit, are full of power, and stir one's heart to its depths. I stood for a little while on the bank by the house over the river, and heard the songs strug- gling in the air with the tremendous roar of the dam. It was the old struggle of nature against the influences of Christianity and civilization. The river asserted its an- cient right, in hoarse and expressive voice. The song in the house mingled with the sound of the river, and gently insinuated its tones so that it took possession of the for- est forces, and while I listened the song burst into chorus, and there was no longer any sound of river to be heard. Much so is it with the actual advance of civilization in these regions. First come the wood-cutters, using the lakes and rivers in their original force ; then follow the farmers and schools and churches ; and the land and the water are subjected to the power of man and the pres- ence of art and Christianity.

SWIFT- WATER FISHING. 317

It was a beautiful night. The moon was high in air across the valley ; white mists were streaming up from the basin below the fall ; weird shadows lay here and there on the cleared ground ; the cry of a loon, from far up the river, came mournfully through the forest; the water raged in the open basin, but the mists above it seemed to hush it somewhat, as if they were its masters ; then sleep came down peacefully on us all.

Early in the morning I was out. Immediately above the dam lay a timber raft used for repairing purposes. This was swinging in the fierce current, held by two stout hawsers made fast on the opposite sides of the river two hundred feet above. This raft was lying in the swift rush of the river toward the sluice-ways, the upper end being some feet above the edge of the still, black water, and the lower end only a few feet from the edge of the dam. Trout ascending the river must make a sharp rush of about a hundred feet up the sluice-ways. The instant they reach the top, they can sink into the deep water of the dam, and here they usually wait to rest after the rush. As yet we had not seen any trout, and I knew nothing of what to expect in the way of size or strength. Standing on the raft I cast on the still water just at the edge of the curve, and the fly swept down like lightning as I drew across toward the raft. I am particular in de- scribing this, as it will illustrate the ability of a well-made seven -ounce rod which I was using. A dozen casts brought nothing; then came the rush. He went over the fly, a foot out of water, turned in the air, and struck with open mouth as he went down. Of course he hooked himself. No skill was needed to accomplish that. In such water with such a leap the trout is sure to fix the barb in his lip or jaw. His first dash was fearful. It

3l8 I GO A- FISHING.

was right downward ; then feeling the line he rose again and turned rapidly toward the dam, and shot down the swift current, seeking to descend the sluice-way. Here the beautiful rod came into play, and with its gentle but uniform and steel-like spring, it swung him head up be- fore he reached the edge of the timbers. If he had gone ten feet farther he would have passed under the gate, and then it would have been all up with my tackle. If he had not been well hooked he would have been swept away by the mere force of the current on his body. Holding him steadily in the current, meeting an occa- sional swift dash, and keeping his upper jaw above wa- ter so that the stream poured into his open throat, it took not more than three minutes to reduce him to such sub- jection that I could swing him alongside of the raft, and lift him out with the landing-net. It was a short, sharp, and spirited contest, and the little rod did superb execu- tion.

Dupont joined me on the raft before I had landed the first trout, and in a few moments was busy as I had been with a strong and lively three-pounder, whose strength he exhausted most skillfully. We had killed six or eight, when I became anxious about my tackle, for it was a very risky place to work in. If one of these stout fel- lows should once happen to gain the edge of the sluice it might be destruction to rod or line, and possibly to both, unless I could save them by a miracle of quick work. So I went up to the house for a somewhat stron- ger and less valued rod. But I had become so accus- tomed to the action of the Norris rod, that, after landing one fish with the heavier rod, I returned to the other and used it till we were called to breakfast.

The ladies were awake and in the best of spirits. I

MOUTH OF CLEAR STREAM. 319

assure you there never was and never will be a more brilliant breakfast party on the banks of the Androscog- gin, even after those days come, which will surely come, when cities will replace the forests. The trout were de- licious, the flavor excellent, the flesh firm and rich, the color as deep red as the darkest Long Island trout. Our boxes of stores supplied abundant variety for the table, so that during the eight or nine days which we passed at Errol Dam we lived in luxury.

All along the river, from the dam down to the bridge, we found more or less trout during the day. As the sun went westward I recalled a talk I had held in the Cole- brook bar-room with a stranger, who said to me, " When you are at Errol Dam go to the mouth of the Clear Stream."

Below the bridge the Androscoggin takes a short turn to the south, and has there formed a broad bay, several hundred feet across. On the west side of this the Clear Stream comes in; and finding a boat near the bridge, at about five o'clock we pushed across, and ran the bow on the bank at the junction of the streams. As it was now late in the season, this was theoretically a good spot for trout to gather, and await the later freshets before they ran up the colder brooks to seek spawning beds. Nor was theory disproved by facts. We found large trout, and abundance of them, and had all the work we wished until dark. That evening we killed twenty-nine trout, each weighing from two to three pounds.

Thereafter we passed the days in somewhat uniform routine : at the dam in the morning, killing fish in the swift water; at the mouth of Clear Stream in the evening, taking from twenty-seven, our smallest catch, to thirty- four, our largest, every evening between sunset and dark.

320 I GO A-FISHING.

One evening we could not find our boat, and walked a mile around the bay through swamps and brush, and finding a small boat in the Clear Stream, appropriated it and had our usual success. We were late in arriving, but the trout rose later than usual, and we killed thirty- four, which weighed something more than seventy pounds. It was profoundly dark and cloudy when we left the boat where we had found it, and sought our way homeward. But we lost ourselves in the swamp, and plunged into holes, and became involved in the snake-like windings of a deep, narrow strip of water, and it was nearly ten o'clock when we relieved the anxieties of our friends at the dam. This was our last night, and the next morn- ing we started for civilization via Bethel in Maine. The drive down the Bear River Notch is hardly inferior in scenery to that through Dixville Notch. All along the road-side we found streams with abundance of small trout, and mountain and valley views which are nowhere to be surpassed.

In after times I have found no change in the fishing at these places, and on the Magalloway, a few miles above Errol Dam, the highest desires of the angler, who seeks waters that have been seldom whipped, may be fully gratified.

XVI.

EVENING AT THE FERNS.

We had been driving all the afternoon over the hills of Westchester County and Connecticut, looking at the streams in which years ago trout were abundant, but from which they have now disappeared. I was visiting a friend in Connecticut, one of those men whom to know is to love — one who had read the lessons of life to ad- vantage— a man of the world who knew the world — a scholar who loved books, and with whom it was a luxury to talk about them — a traveler who had treasure of travel- memory in his heart — a man who made his home a place where he and his fair young wife loved to be, and loved to have those who were of kindred tastes, and where art- ists and students, and men of active business life, and divines met in the pleasantest companies, and always loved to meet. That was the most charming country home in all the land. It was, I say, for my friend Ward has gone to a home of even more light and joy, and the door at the Ferns is not open now. But it's a pleasant home to remember for us poor wanderers. Again and again I am deeply grateful for the blessings of so many happy memories. I have grown old enough to possess more earthly happiness in memories than in possessions or anticipations. As life advances this is the experience of every thoughtful man.

X

322 I GO A-FISHING.

As we rode along that afternoon I recalled the days when I had taken trout in the streams of Westchester County, and told Ward stories of the old time, and at every one of my stories he fired some quaint old English quotation, or a pat passage from Horace, or from a medi- aeval hymn. For he loved, as did I, the old monkish hymns, notwithstanding their bad Latin; and he trans- lated some of them with a force and effect I have not seen equaled by any other translator.

We pulled up on a bridge, and I recalled a scene on that bridge years and years ago. The stream was broad and shallow under the bridge, but narrowed below, and fell suddenly a few inches as it passed under a single rail of the road-side fence into a deep pool. I stood on the bridge and cast a fly over the rail, and struck a half- pound trout, and couldn't get the trout up over the rail, and couldn't get down from the high bridge to. go into the field below, and the result was that I broke my rod — "alas! master, for it was borrowed" — and lost my trout, and learned a lesson. Which lesson may be recorded here for young anglers to read. Never make a cast until you see your way clear to land your fish if one strikes. I remember — and I told the story to my friend — that I was once standing on the railway bridge at Rouse's Point, where I was waiting some hours for a train. I had a strong rod, and was taking black bass with a small spoon ; and at length I walked out on the railway ties, twenty feet above the river, and dropped my spoon in deep wa- ter. Lifting the rod I could bring the spoon up fifteen or twenty feet to the surface, then let it sink, and raise it in the same way again. So I did, again and again for ten minutes, with no result ; and then, as it came up, I saw, directly under and following it to the surface, the gaping

rouse's point. 323

jaws of a gigantic pickerel, an eightecn-pounder at the least. Just one quick jerk, a pause, and the great jaws closed on the spoon. I struck hard, and had him, or rather he had me ; for what was I to do with him ? Two hundred feet from land, on a pile bridge, twenty feet above the water, with such a fish to manage, and a hundred piles standing out of water in every direction — this was a situation to puzzle an angler. As long as he headed southward for Lake Champlain, and swung about in that direction, I was confident; but after ten minutes of that he came north for the St. Lawrence — down the river — passed under me with a swift rush, and then I knew it was all up with my tackle. I snubbed him with all the force of the rod, but that only served to turn him once after he had gone well under the bridge, so that he took a turn around a pile, and of course that was the end of the con- test. After a reasonable delay, I broke my line by a hard pull, and left spoon and pickerel in the depths of the un- known. That all came from the folly of allowing a fish to get the hook when I was in no position to land him or save my tackle. But then my excuse was that I had never dreamed of stirring up such a monster.

We drove homeward. It was an evening in May ; the air soft and balmy — a breath of the coming June. The flush of sunset sanctified the vast expanse of Long Island Sound, and the sails of a hundred vessels were rosy wings. So on tropic seas I have sometimes seen here and there white pelicans and the snowy spoonbills changed at sun- set into birds of paradise.

There can be no scene more beautiful than was that evening view from the balcony at the Ferns. Under the branches of the trees, through the masses of the vines that overhung the piazza, we looked away off to the south and

324

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west, over the sound to the low hills of Long Island, and eastward to the meeting of the water with the horizon. The birds were innumerable, and if one had not gotten to be accustomed to it, their chatter and song would have forbidden conversation.

Occupying no small part of the piazza was a vast aviary, in which Mrs. Ward had a host of pets, the birds of many lands. And the afternoon previous Ward had gathered some handfuls of the new-mown grass from the lawn and spread it over the top of he wires, and, to our surprise and delight, two weaver-birds had joyously seized the material and woven a marvelous fabric — a hollow nest — a bottle with a narrow neck hanging in the middle of the cage. They were a fierce little pair of defenders of their home altar, and would let no other bird come near it ; and as we sat and smoked we watched their curious and cunning ways, and our talk ran somewhat in this wise :

" Where did they come from ?"

" Bought in New York at a bird shop."

" You don't know whether they were imported birds or hatched in this country ?"

" No ; but it would be curious if they were hatched here. It would indicate an instinct beyond explanation if birds should build nests in that form without having been taught to do it, or without having seen it done. Do you suppose that the child of ten or ten hundred genera- tions of potters would know how to make an earthenware plate without being taught ?"

" No, I don't. But we are apt to confound instinct and reason. The common notion that brutes do not reason is, of course, erroneous. The possession of memory alone does not imply reason, but the use of memory for com-

BIRDS AT PRAYERS. 325

parison, or for judgment and decision, is necessarily an act of reason. There are few domestic animals which do not exercise reason constantly. Many wild animals are very sharp reasoners."

" Did you ever detect reason in a trout ?"

" Something very like it, but not so clearly indicated as in land animals. I have frequently watched trout when swimming in groups, as they often do in small lakes, and where thirty or forty trout are leisurely moving around near the shores, they generally have two or more guards, or look-outs, swimming at a reasonable distance in ad- vance, who give them warning of any visible danger. This and other habits look like reason. But whether fish have any means of communication with each other ex- cept by sight, I confess I dare not say. I have sometimes thought a trout had gone down stream before me and

told the community to look out for an enemy. A 's

birds yonder have beyond question means of exchanging ideas."

"You would think so if you saw them at prayers."

"Wha— at?"

" Yes ; at prayers. It isn't any thing less. There are birds of every country under the whole heavens, and with voices as various as the languages of men, and you hear what a wild concert of delight they keep up all day long. But every day this entire group of birds assemble in si- lence, and if it isn't a prayer-meeting I don't know what it is. There is no forewarning that we can detect. While they are all chattering, singing, playing here, there, and every where, suddenly one of them, sometimes one and sometimes another, utters a peculiar call, totally distinct from his ordinary note. Whatever bird it is, the call is much the same, and instantly every bird stops his play

326 I GO A-FISHING.

and his noise. They gather in rows on the perches, shorten their necks so as ahnost to sink their heads into their feathers, and make no motion of wing, head, or foot for a space of thirty minutes, and often longer."

" But, my dear fellow, when did this occur ?"

" When ? I tell you it is almost a daily occurrence. Ordinarily you can not approach the aviary without frightening some of the birds and producing a sharp com- motion ; but while this exercise is going on nothing dis- turbs them. They are birds of every land and climate as you see ; but this is their custom, and no one of them fails to attend, or behaves ill in meeting."

" Queer, isn't it .?"

"More than queer. It's well worth studying; and I sometimes wonder whether birds in their natural condi- tion ever do the same thing. You may think it some- thing like mesmerism, for the leader keeps up his curious call-note throughout the service. The instant it is ended they break up with a shout of delight, and rush around singing and having a jolly time of it, as if thoroughly re- freshed. What's your theory, Effendi ?"

"I haven't a theory. It's something new to me. I have seen birds talking to one another many a time, but I never heard of this idea before. We all know that dogs tell each other stories, and it's beyond dispute that dogs dream. A bee that has found honey flies off and comes back with all the hive. I have often seen a colt try to tell a calf something, but the calf was a calf, and couldn't understand. In Egypt, the dogs of the cities have their quarters, and keep out intruders of their own species. I have seen droves of them facing one another across an imaginary line, and making no attack except as one or more crossed that line, then the whole pack would

AMERICAN ROMANCE. 327

descend on the aggressor and drive him back. I fancy- that the life of a horse or a dog might be as interesting, if all its emotions, thoughts, incidents, and dreams were written out — an autobiography, for instance — as the lives of millions of men and women would be. For, after all, innumerable men live and die without enough emotion or incident, without enough of hope or passion, to supply material for a single day to men like us.

"Yes, I have thought thus often in Italy, the land of romance, when I have seen miserable peasant women living stupid lives among old glories. We speak of men living like brutes, but that means generally their external and visible life. How much lower than brute life their mental life is we seldom think. The gaily-dressed and brilliant peasant girl is the exception, rarely seen even in Italy ; and for one such there are a thousand women there who from childhood to old age and the grave have never known an emotion of great joy or great sorrow, who do not even feel for the loss of children so much grief as a bird feels at the death of a fledgling. There's a difference in lives, a vast difference; and in our coun- try among the higher classes the same differences are noteworthy. American life is more emotional than any other."

" You think so ?"

" I don't doubt it. Little as men think it, there is more romance in our ordinary lives here in America than in any other country, ancient or modern, of which we have any record. There is not only more of the ' rough and tumble,' more adventure, collision, sudden change, part- ing and meeting, rapid accession and loss of fortune, more incident and accident, but the inner life of Ameri- cans is more romantic, and the private history of families

328 I GO A-FISHING.

is more full of strange and startling occurrences. We are a mixed population, made up from all nations ; and the most lonesome country village is not surprised at the arrival of a Chinaman, a Kanaker, an Arab, or a Parsee. We are great travelers, and there is scarcely a country girl in the land, who has been to school for a year, who does not dream of going to Rome and Jerusalem. And many of them go."

" You are right," said Mrs. Ward, who with John Steen- burger came out to the piazza at this moment and joined in the talk. " A great many persons imagine that Ameri- can life is so very commonplace and of such even tenor that romance in connection with it is scarcely possible. But there is evidence enough to the contrary. Lady Hester Stanhope's life and death are generally regarded as making up one of the most extraordinary records of modern times. But there was nothing in it really more romantic than in the life of your old friend Roberts. Surely that poor enthusiastic American's days were abun- dantly full of incident."

"Who was he, Effendi.? I never heard of him."

"A is right. Alfred Roberts was a man whose

name deserves to be remembered.

" I met him first some years ago in the street of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem. Passing such a man in such a place startled me. We did not speak; and I met him several times, wondering whose calm pale face and gentle eye that was among the grim-visaged Arabs.

" One evening, when I was seated by the fire in my ' hired house ' on the Via Dolorosa, burning sacred olive- wood from the mountain of the Ascension, and talking with my friend Righter (who now sleeps profoundly at Diarbekir, on the banks of the Tigris), the old man came

ALFRED ROBERTS.

329

in, and Righter, who knew him, made us acquainted. I can not describe to you the tenderness of the affection which I learned to feel for him in the course of a month, during which I saw him almost daily.

" He was a man of rare simplicity of character. An in- expressible gentleness pervaded his whole life.

" A cooper by trade in America, at Mystic, in Connecti- cut, and then in Chenango County, in New York, he had lived to be an old man when he conceived the idea of devoting his life to distributing the Word of God, without note or comment, wherever he could find persons to re- ceive it. He had no property or means, but he declined a connection with any society, or any personal pecuniary aid so long as he was able to work for himself. He ac- cepted money to be used in purchasing Bibles and Testa- ments, but for no other purpose. He worked his passage to Liverpool, thence to Malta, thence to Constantinople, and finally to Jerusalem. The journey was one of some years, and all the way he scattered the Word of God. In Malta, for months, he devoted himself to Italian sailors, and he used to say, truly I doubt not, that he had sent more Bibles into Italy, by fishermen and traders at Malta, than all the Bible and Missionary Societies by any and all other means. In Constantinople the American residents collected money to present him a new suit of clothes. He declined them as soon as he heard the proposal, ac- cepted the donation in Bibles, and wore his gray suit to Jerusalem, and probably never had another.

" His faith in the simple Word of God was magnificent. It was his whole life.

" Walking the streets of the Holy City, meeting Greek and Jew, barbarian and Scythian, bond and free, he knew no language but his mother tongue, yet managed to hold

330 I GO A-FISHING.

conversation with each, and to win the admiration and affection of all. I know no one in Jerusalem who did not love that old man. The monks of the Terra Santa, many of whom I knew well, had pleasant words to speak of him; Armenian priests looked kindly on him. I don't believe that Mohammed Dunnuf himself, the principal sheik of the Mosque of Omar, ever harbored an unkind thought of the patient, gentle old American, or that a Moham- medan boy or woman who knew him w^ould ever spit curses before him in the streets, as they did a thousand times at me. Pursuing his quiet way, he walked the streets of Jerusalem year after year, in the constant labor of love to which he had devoted his life. His wants were very few, and his expenses a mere trifle. In 1858, he yielded to the infirmities of age and disease, and then lay for three years on his bed, in the same room in a hospi- tal on Mount Zion, patiently waiting the change.

" I had no words with which to express my own satisfac- tion when I heard by letter from the United States con- sul at Jerusalem that my old friend had at last reached the Jerusalem of his earnest expectation. No more weary climbing up the sides of Olivet, to sit down sadly on the summit, gazing into the sky which there received out of sight his ascended Lord. No more dark nights of sleep- less pain on the sides of Zion, praying for the coming of the Great Physician with his gift of rest !

" I know where they buried him, for the last time I was in Jerusalem I went to his grave as to that of a hero and a saint.

" Nowhere on earth does a man sleep the long sleep in such company as at Jerusalem.

" Outside the walls, on the southern slope of Zion, beau- tiful for situation as of old, there is a little English burial-

BURIAL ON MOUNT ZION. 33 1

place, not far from the Greek and Latin cemeteries. In the latter, close under the wall of the city, lies Cornelius Bradford, whom many old New-Yorkers knew and loved. I know not that any other American, except my old friend, sleeps on Mount Zion ; but they have buried him in that little English cemetery, which looks toward Bethlehem, overhanging the dark valley of the sons of Hinnom and the field of Aceldama. In that valley lie myriads on myriads of the dead. The descendants of Abraham for nearly four thousand years have been buried under the shadow of Moriah and Zion. The followers of the camel driver lie there in hosts, with faces turned to the grave of their prophet. In the old tombs on the hill-side, the countless dead of the crusades, with thousands of pilgrims from Christian Europe, are heaped in ghastly piles of crumbling skeletons. The followers of Alexander the Great, the Roman legions of Titus, the Persians of Chos- roes, the Moors of El-Hakim the mad Caliph, the Norse- men of Sigurd the Viking Crusader, men of every land, by millions, lie in that dark valley under the hill of David. Somewhere there, the Psalmist king and warrior waits to resume his crown and song. Somewhere there, perhaps the sister of Lazarus rests from much care and trouble, till the Master cometh again and calleth for her. Not very far away, Godfrey, who refused to wear a crown of gold where his Master had worn a crown of thorns, and Baldwin the valiant, lie in rock-hewn tombs, guarding the way to Calvary.

" But when the Lord shall come ' in like manner' as he ascended from the Mount of Olives, and the dead, small and great, shall rise around Jerusalem, I doubt not that among saints and princes and prophets and martyrs, the calm face of the old American missionary will be serenely

332

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fixed on the face of his Lord, and the ' Well done, good and faithful servant,' will reach no ear in clearer tones than his.

" I saw him last standing in the gateway of my hired house in the Via Dolorosa, looking sadly at me as I mounted my horse and rode down the filthy street on my way to the Damascus Gate, where I left Jerusalem, as I then thought, forever. It will be pleasant to meet my old friend on the shining pavements of the other Jeru- salem.

" Yes, Ward, that humble life rose to the fullest grand- eur. He was a great man, and his story needs no embel- lishment to make it something more than a romance of the real life of an American."

"Americans," said John Steenburger, who had been hitherto silent — "Americans wander a great deal more than their countrymen dream of. I recollect that I once had my attention directed to this with reference to one little village in New England, and I could recall no less than four persons, whom I had met in Asia and Africa, who were wanderers from home, settled here and there among Mohammedans, all four from that village, and no one of them near or knowing of another. I knew a girl once, the daughter of one of my neighbors, a farmer well to do in the world. She was as bright and lovely a child as was ever known in that part of the country. I think I might say that she was as beautiful when she grew up as any woman that any of you have ever seen. Those who knew her best believed that her soul was as pure as the spring by her father's door. She was the pet of all the country, and her admirers were innumerable. Her education was good, and at eighteen she was sent to board- mg-school to ' complete it,' as they call it. Once in a

A ROVING GIRL. 333

while she was at home during the next two years, and to this day they who saw her tell me that she was as gentle and lovely as ever was daughter of Eve ; that she went back to school with reluctance ; that she parted with her father in an agony of tears. This was some years ago. I have seen that girl, that fair-haired child of my old neighbor, a ballet-dancer on the boards at the San Carlo in Naples; and when I sought her out and wanted to send her home, she laughed at me, and ridiculed the idea of going home to the old farm-house."

" What became of her ?"

" I wish I knew. The olci man never asks me if I do know, but he looks so wistfully at me of a Sunday in church and when we happen to meet on the road, that I do wish I had some intelligence to give him of her, if only that she is dead. That would be a comfort. I saw her again once under odd circumstances. The Effendi and I were in Alexandria, at the Europa, and Caesare, the landlord, asked us one morning if we would go to the opera in the evening. It was in the days of Said Pasha, when Egypt had not as yet been Europeanized, as Ismail calls it. An opera in Egypt struck us as odd, and we said, ' Yes, get us a box ;' and then went off for the day to the Effendi's excavations in the catacombs. In the even- ing, after dinner, we had forgotten all about it ; but Caesare reminded us, and we started, with two Arabs carrj'ing lan- terns, to find the opera-house in a narrow street. As we approached we saw them lighting up the entrance, and, after a delay of five minutes in a small cloak-room, we were ushered to our box. I give you my word we two were the solitary persons in the house, and we had Lucia for once to ourselves. Was it not so, Effendi V

"Exactly so."

334 I GO A-FISHING.

" The company was small, and the opera was cut down; but you may imagine my surprise when, in one of the in- ferior parts, I recognized the daughter of my neighbor. I never knew whether she recognized me. It was a strange affair altogether. I sent for the manager the next morning; but they brought me word that the com- pany was only a lot of Italian strollers, and had sailed for Smyrna that very morning. Effendi, what were you tell- ing me about a girl you saw in the East last winter ?"

"Only another example of American wandering. It was not any one that I knew, but it shows that American girls as well as men are sometimes rovers. I saw a very beautiful girl on horseback in one of the Oriental cities, a slight, fragile-looking creature, a pretty face, remarka- ble for large and fine eyes, which struck you as very sor- rowful in their expression. She rode well. I met her several times. You will not often see a more attractive woman. She could not have been much over nineteen. Asking about her, I found that she was under the protec- tion of a well-known Pasha, but she was not one of his wives. Poor fool ! she was and is a fool, if she still lives, for her fate is as sure as the succession of days. Several men of credibility and position told me that she was an American girl, and I once heard her speak English with a decided American accent."

" There is romance every where. A little incident hap- pened to the Effendi and myself last summer on the sea- shore. We had gone down for a few days of sea-fishing, and it happened that the little hotel was suddenly crowd- ed to overflowing, so that when we sat down at the supper- table it was difficult to get any one to serve us. Look- ing for a waiter, I saw, standing on the opposite side of the table, a dark-faced girl, of fourteen or thereabouts,

MYSTERY OF AMAGANSET. 335

who was Staring with all her eyes, and doing nothing. I said, ' Will you give me some milk ?' She looked at me, but didn't move. She is French, I said, and repeated my request in French. She only stared the more. Try her in Italian, said the Effendi; and he tried her in Italian, but she only stared. Then, in a fit of laughing despera- tion, I growled at her two words in Arabic, and she sprang for the milk, with a bright smile on her face, and brought it. Now that was odd enough in a little American sea- shore inn, ten miles from a railway. But it was explained very simply afterward. She was a Syrian girl, brought home as a servant by an American lady who happened to be in the hotel, and had sent her to help serve the crowd. Nevertheless, you have the foundation for a ro- mance in that story."

"While you are on the subject of American romances," said Mrs. Ward, " I'll read you a letter from the Effendi himself, written some years ago, when we had been at Montauk together. I don't vouch for the truth of the story, but it fits the subject. Wait till I go and find it."

So we smoked in silence, and the twilight grew dark, and at length Mrs. Ward returned, and, sitting just within the long window, read what she called

THE MYSTERY OF AMAGANSET.

"We left Montauk in the last hours of a delicious sum- mer day. As we crossed the plain at Fort Pond we put up the largest flock of plover that I have ever seen, and got a shot into them at a long distance, which added six to the heap already covering the carriage-bottom. The noise of their flight was like thunder, scaring the cattle that grazed on the plain.

" The sun was setting as we passed Stratton's, and we

;^;^6 I GO A- FISHING.

hastened on hoping to reach Napeague before dark, but the gloom overtook us before we passed Osborn's (the first house), and by the time we reached the Mosquito Territory it was profoundly dark, and the savages had it all their own way.

" The next hour was fearful, but as we emerged from its horrors on the heights near Amaganset, a cool breeze revived us, and the first light of that village cheered us amazingly.

" ' Do you know that there is a mystery of Amaganset?' demanded Peter, who rode with the driver, and smoked furiously in silence all across Napeague.

" ' No,' exclaimed the party unanimously ; ' do you ?'

" ' No,' said Peter ; and the smoke increased about his cloudy head.

" ' What the deuce does Peter mean ?' suggested the Squire, in a low voice.

" ' I mean this, that Jonathan Pierson told me a story once about some Long Island village, and when I came through Amaganset the other day, I took it that must be the place. The story fits there anyhow.'

" 'Give us the story and let us fit it then, oh Peter.'

" Puff — puff — Peter usually pulls hard at the cigar be- fore he begins, and we judged correctly that he would yield to our entreaties. And at length, little by little, with interruptions to relight his cigar, we got the substance of it.

" Along the road that leads to the beach from the lone- some village of (Peter called it Amaganset, and

so will I, and no Amaganset man need trouble himself to say it didn't happen there) lay a fine farm, in old times, owned by Stephen Laton, a well-to-do man who lived in a house by the road-side, with a wife and one child. All

MYSTERY OF AMAGANSET. 337

this happened a great while ago, so that the story is more easily to be credited.

"The daughter, Bessie Laton, was a beautiful child, and grew up to be a very beautiful woman. Contrary to the custom in those days, she was sent away to be educated, and for three years, from her fifteenth to her eighteenth year, she was in New York, at the house of a wealthy uncle, who was to leave her all his property some day.

" He might have done more for her by looking more closely after her life then, for Bessie was no child even in her childish years, but always had great freedom of will, a strong determination, and more than her share of self- reliance. With all this she had an abounding pride, which had always stamped her character, and no one who knew her well failed to see that she had ambition which would rest at nothing short of the highest position in woman's empire. She loved and was loved by all the village, but she lived a secret life of dreams and hopes and self-prom- ises, which her city life afterw^ard helped her to encourage.

" No one knew what she did in those three years, ex- cept that her step grew stately, her air assumed the graces of the accomplished lady, and after all she came home — to her sea-shore home — a changed woman. The gay- ety of her whole character seemed to be lost, and a sore and terrible secret evidently preyed on her mind.

"In this secret the whole village was interested; old wives wondered what ailed the child, and old men shook their heads and said this was what comes of ' eddicating children.' And at last the secret was half told, and Bes- sie's name was the by-word of the town.

" To her mother alone she said, ' I am married, but I can not tell you any more until he comes himself to take me.' The shame and agony in which her life now burned

Y

338 I GO A -FISHING.

away maybe imagined but can not be told. Years passed and he did not come. Alone in the cottage, seldom vent- uring beyond its walls, she dwelt in secret, growing every day more pale, yet every day more beautiful. Four winters had dashed their storms on the Atlantic coast, and a fifth was passing, and Bessie was dying as she had prayed to die.

" It was a wild December night, and there was danger of a wreck on the coast, to which all the villagers had gone. The guns had been heard booming all the day previous, and they said she would go ashore on the half flood, and be beyond the help of man.

" In the house of Stephen Laton the mother and daugh- ter were seated, as in many a winter night before, by the great fire that blazed up the chimney, silent mostly, yet once in a while lifting their eyes each to the other's coun- tenance. There was a strange resemblance in the two women, though one was old and haggard, and the other young and beautiful. The likeness was doubtless in the prevailing expression of woe that looked out of both their eyes, as they gazed silently and steadfastly into the flash- ing fire and listened to the roaring tempest.

" ' Mother,' said Bessie, springing to her feet at length, with a cry of anguish — ' Mother, pray God to let me die.'

" * Patience, Bessie, my child, patience.'

" * Patience, mother ! I have been patient four years — I am patient — but I would to God I were lying out yon- der in the old grave-yard, with all the old folk and young folk of all the graves, instead of being here to-night !'

" She was magnificent as she stood there, her long white night-robe buttoned to her throat and flowing to her feet, as she clasped her hands and looked up to heav- en. Certainly she was very beautiful, with the beauty of approaching death.

MYSTERY OF AMAGANSET. 339

"The tramp of men disturbed the scene, as they brought in a body from the wreck. Bessie passed into the inner room, whither in a moment her mother brought in her stout arms the form of a young, slender, fair- haired girl, whose face of very delicate beauty was now almost heavenly in what seemed at first the peace of death.

"They laid her in Bessie's bed, and in an hour by dili- gent care had succeeded in restoring animation if not consciousness. Once she had murmured ' Philippe," and Bessie sprang up with a flush on her countenance at the sound, but, sinking back with a half-suppressed moan, continued her exertions in silence.

" In the mean time the bodies of several men were brought into the old kitchen. Among them was one richly dressed, and bearing marks of rank and wealth, for those were days when travelers wore more of the insignia of position than now. He was young and strong, and it was manifest that he was not dead. But a strange stu- por, whether of cold or otherwise, had taken possession of him, and he lay motionless on the floor before the fire, until a sharp cry from the inner room reached his be- numbed senses.

" The lady had at length opened her eyes, and a sense of her position slowly dawned on her intellect. A few questions in French, which Bessie understood and an- swered, sufficed to explain all, and then she wailed aloud in the perfect abandonment of woe —

" ' Philippe, mon Philippe ! oh Mon Dieu, il est mort ; mon ame, mon cceur, mort, mort !' and she sank back fainting on the pillow.

" He heard that cry, and rose to his feet. At first, for an instant, he seemed to be confused, but the next mo-

340 I GO A -FISHING.

ment the whole truth crossed his mind, and, with a courtly bow to those who surrounded him, he said, ' I understand all. Pardon me. It is I that am wanted' — and without further parley stalked into the room where the two girls lay side by side.

" ' Oh, God, it is he ! — it is he !' shrieked the unknown, in a voice of extremest joy, and, reaching out her two hands to him with a smile, relapsed into unconsciousness.

" Seeing two persons on the bed where he had thought to see but one, he hesitated.

" ' I beg pardon — '

" At the sound of his voice, Bessie Laton leaned forward suddenly and looked into his countenance. No one may hope to describe the gleam that flashed across her face as she spoke one word —

"'Philip!'

"'Bessie! Bessie!' said he, staggering, rather than rushing forward, and then he fell on the floor by the bed- side, his hands seizing and his lips kissing the folds of her garment that swept across the feet of the dead girl who lay beside her.

" ' Philip, is it you at last — my husband, my beloved. Have you come at last to see me die ?'

" ' Die ! Who talks of death ? Marie, Marie. Bessie, wake her, speak to her — rouse her — she is cold. Did you say dead .? Dead ?'

" ' What mean you, Philip ? Who is this ?'

" ' This ! She is Marie, Marie.'

" ' And what to you ?'

" ' To me ? She is my — my — my — '

"'Philip! Speak not the word; wife or what, I care not. I see all now. Silence, I say ! They have called me by the name you have given that child ! Oh wretch-

MYSTERY OF AMAGANSET. 34I

ed man ! Know you not that having left me to bear the agony of that curse falsely was enough, but you must give the foul name to her too ? Philip, I have it in my heart to curse you. I know not whether I should pray God to- night to damn you for your sin or no. I love you, I love you, Philip, and I hate you too.'

" She glared at him with her fierce black eyes, and he was silent, but looked at her.

"'Aye, look at me — your wreck, your ruin. See you this cheek — you kissed it, loved to kiss it. It will be food for worms next spring. God knows if it be not next week ! See these arms. How you loved their clasp, and yet you wandered off from them, and sought embraces elsewhere, and forgot them. What delights those were, oh Philip 1 Have you had such with this frail child } Did you love her, Philip ? I love her too, for this, that she loved you, and was betrayed by you. Did she know that you had a wife, or did she think her cheek the first that ever lay on your breast ? Did you ever tell her of me .?'

" She paused and glared at him more fiercely, and he was silent still. Only a hoarse murmur as if he would speak escaped his lips, but he had not yet spoken.

" ' And yet I love you, Philip. I love you ! I that am dying say it again, again. Dying — oh God, is this life ! I prayed just now for death, and now I pray to live, for I have found him ! found him in the arms of another, but what of that ! I would tear him out of the arms of an angel — and clasp him to my own heart to be — as he is — mine — my own. Philip, you have killed me. But — but — but — lay your head here once more, once more, my husband 1'

" She reached her arms out to him, and he threw him- self across the dead form of the French girl, into the em-

342 I GO A -FISHING.

brace that waited him. Their lips met, and they were si- lent while life grew to immortality of joy in that long kiss, and then there was a cold shudder in her frame — a re- laxing of the clasp — a strange fierce smile on her face — and they carried him away.

" She did not die till two or three weeks later, but she never knew father, mother, or husband again.

" Who he was no one ever knew, for his lips were sealed, though he watched by her until she died. Then he dis- appeared, and the people for years after that wondered over the story. A stone by her grave rescued her name from infamy, though its story was brief and indefinite. But the villagers readily believed good of one they had loved so well, and it was even whispered by some that the husband of Bessie Laton was a king's son.

"Years afterward, one of those wandering sons of Long Island, who are to be found wherever the traveler has gone, was in the presence of a monarch whose name is known in history and story. That traveler, though but a boy when Bessie Laton died, remembered with perfect clearness the face of her husband, and he now saw it once more. But the position of the tall and stately man, with dark face and downcast eye, standing on the right hand of his sovereign, forbade any attempt to remind him then and there of the tempestuous night when he found his betrayed and deserted wife dying on the shore of Long Island.

"You may well believe that Peter's story lasted till we reached Easthampton. Now don't let any Long-Islander bother you by doubting this story, and disputing Peter's facts. It happened somewhere if it did'nt on Long Isl- and, at least Peter says so, and who can tell how many and what secrets the grave-yards of the old country vil-

JOHN LEDYARD. 343

lages keep low under ground ! What red lips, could they open in the dust, would tell love tales ! What forms, could they move, would nestle in the clasps of love, those close embraces of which the grave itself and decay and dust can hardly bar the memory! What thin old lips would whisper stories of youth and passion and madness."

" Is that all of it, Mrs. Ward .?"

"All."

" Is it true .?"

" Ask the Effendi."

" How much of it is founded on fact, old man .?''

" Upon my word, John, if any one but A had said

it, I wouldn't believe I ever wrote the letter. I remem- ber nothing about it. But I'll tell you what I do remem- ber— talking about wandering Americans — and that is how I once hunted in Cairo for the grave of John Led- yard, whose life was of the most romantic kind. I always had a boy's admiration of him, and the first time I went to Cairo I had it prominently in mind to see his last rest- ing-place. It didn't occur to me that I should have any trouble in finding it.

" I had thought of taking a walk around the city, and calling at three or four places to make inquiries ; and in my ignorance I had supposed that an hour's inquiry here and there would soon determine, one way or the other, whether I could accomplish my object.

" My wish was a pious one. I believe that all Amer- icans feel some interest in it, though I am not aware that any one had before made the attempt that I made to gratify it.

"From childhood I had heard Ledyard's name men- tioned frequently in the family, as a relative and friend of

344 I GO A -FISHING.

my father's father, and his letters to his mother, few of which have been published, had formed my study when- ever I could get hold of the dim old manuscripts. I had a boyish veneration for his name and memory, and as I grew older I studied much his bold and ambitious char- acter. It was my pleasure to trace his eventful history from that adventurous voyage down the Connecticut in his canoe, through all its devious ways around the world, up to the moment when a dark veil is suddenly drawn across it and the eye can no longer follow it.

" It was in Cairo that he died : no one knows where, or how. The biographies of him are brief in their ac- counts, and the private information which is possessed in the family is quite as brief. It is understood only that he was taken sick while waiting to commence his voyage up the Nile, and that he lay in one of the convents, then the only places in which Christian strangers found shelter, and finally died, alone or attended only by unknown priests.

" None who have studied his ambitious but gentle and affectionate character could fail to be interested in the obscurity which surrounds his last moments, or to imag- ine the visions of his home that must have haunted his dying couch. The sounds of early years, the roar of the Connecticut, the bell of the chapel in college, the surf on the beach of Long Island, the wind among the pine-trees over his mother's house, all these doubtless disturbed (or did they calm ?) his fevered brain. If he spoke any thing in his delirium, it must have been of the great name he was to win for himself in his life of bold travels, of the bitterness of death now when his brightest dreams were to be realized, of hope and ambition disappointed, and with these he mingled, as always before he was accus-

OLD CAIRO. 345

tomed to do, affectionate words for the few that he loved as his own soul. But of all this no record remains ; nor is it known whose hand closed his eyes, and composed his weary limbs, which after long travel had at length found rest. All this I thought to inquire about, but I had little hope of success when I knew more of Cairo.

" If in a convent, Ledyard probably died in one of the Latin, Greek, or Coptic convents, for there are more than one of each in or near Cairo.

" In the Latin I caused inquiries to be made, but with- out success. There were no books, no records, no old men, no one who could furnish any information on any subject later than eighteen hundred years ago. Elsewhere I conducted my own inquiries.

" We mounted the donkeys one morning, and rode to an Armenian church, which stands in a cemetery about a mile from the city.

"Winding our way for two miles through the dark nar- row passages which pass for streets, we emerged at the gate that leads to old Cairo, and cantering along the road in the midst of a crowd of donkeys, camels, women with fruit, children carrying melons as large as their heads on the top of them, men riding donkeys they could much easier have carried, beggars in troops, and Bedouins in- numerable, we at length reached the church and entered it. The style of the interior was a remote imitation of European churches ; but it was a small, meagre, and un- interesting affair, and, having glanced at its paintings, I addressed myself to my business. Vain attempt. The attendant was an old man, but he never heard of an American dying there, and there were no books nor rec- ords— nothing whatever. I might as well have inquired in Paris. So I went on down the road to old Cairo.

346 I GO A- FISHING.

" Old Cairo is three miles from modern Cairo. The desert sand stretches between them. As you approach the old city, riding over the sand-hills, you will perceive several miniature cities — small dense masses of houses, presenting only a blank wall to the outside view, through which a low arched door-way or heavily barred gate gives admission to the lanes or streets of a densely populated village. Imagine a hundred houses packed closely to- gether, with no streets, but only passages, four to eight or ten feet wide, winding around among them. Such are these settlements of Egyptian Christians. Fully protected against Bedouins by their lofty walls, they have but to close the gates against an attack and go to sleep in their houses. It was such a place as this before which I drew rein, and we dismounted and entered. A bright-looking little girl was the porteress, and led us in. We asked her the way to the church of the Greeks. She would show us : so we followed her up one alley and down another, up a long flight of stone steps, up another longer, across a marble pavement, up another and a fourth flight of steps, and she then called aloud and left us in the room alone. It was three stories from the ground, and while we wondered where we were a young priest advanced, and with a huge key opened a door before us, and we found ourselves in the Church of St. George. It was a strange and curious looking little chapel, hung around with pictures that might have been of the fourteenth century, so quaint and intensely horrible were they. Men with giant heads and figures disproportioned stared on us from the panels, but there was nothing to interest us, and, after a brief glance, I proceeded to make my inquiries.

"A more stupid specimen of humanity one could hardly find, and yet he was not so stupid looking. But it w^as in

A GREEK DECEIVER. 347

vain that I endeavored to ascertain any thing about the American traveler. He was unable to tell me any thing, and I doubt whether he knew of such a place as America. I asked him to go into the convent and bring me any books that they had. He produced some old manuscript Prayer-books, but nothing of value, and I gave it up in disgust. I asked him if there were not any of the other priests that could possibly give me some information. He said ' No; there was no one that knew any thing about it.' ' No old men ?' ' None.' I knew he lied, but what could I do ? We wanted to find the way to the Coptic church, which we knew to be near by, and within the same walls. The one we particularly wished to find is the oldest, and is said to cover a grotto in which Mary and Joseph, with the infant Savior, rested and lived while in Egypt. We asked him to direct us. Here stupidity vanished, and de- ceit and lying took its place. Be it known that he and his sect deny the authenticity of this Coptic grotto. Hence his unwillingness to direct us to it. He said he had never heard of such a place. ' But it is near here.?' ' No, it is not. There is no such place. Joseph and Mary never were in Cairo.' ^But there is such a place, and it is close to this spot.' He did not know of any Joseph that was ever in Cairo but Joseph Saladin, and perhaps it was Joseph's Well we were looking for. That was at the cit- adel in Cairo. By this time we saw the fellow's drift, and we gave him a chance to practice lying. We cross-ex- amined him, and he added denial to denial, and we left him.

" Not a hundred yards from him, in the same village, we found the church, the little girl leading us. The old and dirty Arab who opened it for us to enter was the poorest specimen of a sexton I had ever seen. He had not

348 I GO A-FISHING.

Strength enough to help bury a ghost. But he showed us the church, and under its pavement the grotto, into which we descended. It was possibly an early chapel — one of those subterranean places of worship used by the Christians in years that are now forgotten, and over which they afterward built their church. But there is no ev- idence even of this, nor is there book or record of past years by which to determine even the period when the structure above the ground was built.

" Tradition says that it is as old as the days of the Em- peror Diocletian, and Wilkinson describes an inscription of that date somewhere in the community which is in- closed within these walls ; but we could not find it. Nor could we find the tomb of Ledyard, nor trace of it. The miserable old keeper of the church showed me a pile of manuscript books, but they were only Coptic forms of worship. He held out a plate for bucksheesh as we came out of the door, which we deposited, whereupon he dropped the plate and held out his hand for some on private ac- count, assuring us that the former donation was purely for the public. We begged him to take his share out of the public account, and putting our sticks across the backs of twenty beggars who denied us exit, escaped into the air, having accumulated such quantities of fleas as tor- mented us till night-time. The garden of the Greek con- vent remained to be seen, for here in former years the Greeks were accustomed to sell graves to English Chris- tians. But it was also their custom to sell the same graves over and over again, so that no certainty of re- pose was guaranteed by the purchase. Alas for Led- yard ! He was not rich, and I doubt much if any one was with him when he died who would have paid a price for a burial-place for him when all the desert

LEDYARD S GRAVE.

349

lay unboiight around Cairo. And if he was buried here he was disturbed long since to make room for his suc- cessors.

" My search was vain. I continued it persistently. Through various persons in Cairo I attempted to institute inquiries, but the answer was always the same. No one remembered him, none of the old men had any recollec- tion of his death, no books remain to speak of him, no record was made, or if made, none was kept of that pe- riod, and I believe I may consider it settled that the grave of Ledyard will never be found until He finds it who will lose no one in the awakening.

" There was one other, and but one other, direction to look for his resting-place, and that was, I believe, the place where it is most probable that he lies.

" Around the walls of Cairo roll the waves of desert sand. When you pass out of the gates to the eastward, the instant you leave the city you look back at the walls and gates, and before and around you at the desert. There are no suburbs. But on these hills of sand lie the dead Moslems. Thousands and hundreds of thousands, millions of men lie in this dust, awaiting the coming of the angel. Here lie a hundred thousand men that heard the war-cry of Richard Cceur de Lion ; here lie a hun- dred thousand men that saw the face of Louis the Saint ; here lie hosts of those that fled before the arm of God- frey. And from those days to this the dead of Cairo have Iain down in the dust around their city walls, calmly con- fident that they will not oversleep the day when they shall meet their prophet.

" I stood on one of the hills and saw the sun set, and I imagined for one instant the scene which would be pre- sented to the eye if the covering could be thrown back

350 I GO A- FISHING.

and the graves exposed to view, and I shrank in horror from the ghastly vision.

" But somewhere here I think the tired traveler found repose, and I trust will find it undisturbed. It were bet- ter to sleep thus, with all the old dead of a thousand years, than to sleep in a bought grave at the mercy of" a Greek Christian. To him it was terrible to die thus. To no man did death ever come with more of terror. But I doubt not that when his stout soul fully realized the pres- ence of the dread angel he thought that, after all, next to the church-yard at his home, where his mother's eye would look on his grave till she slept by his side, this sleep in the sands of the Arabian desert, on the banks of the lordly Nile, was what he would have chosen who had seen all the world to choose from."

" We have talked enough of wandering Americans," said Ward. " Let us go in and have some music".

And we went into the large room, which Kensett and Church and Mignot and Haseltine and Casilear and other friends of my friend had helped to adorn and make

cheery ; and Dr. C came over from the parsonage,

and we discussed original sin and trout, Shakespeare and Miss Braddon, Bernard of Clugny and Bret Harte, and so the evening passed into night, and the Ferns fell asleep along toward the breaking of the next May morning.

XVII.

GOING HOME.

The sun has gone down. The stars are beginning to be visible. The breeze has died away, and there is no ripple on the lake, nor any sound in the tree-tops. Let us go home.

The contentment which fills the mind of the angler at the close of his day's sport is one of the chiefest charms in his life. He is just sufficiently wearied in body to be thoughtful, and the weariness is without nervousness, so that thoughts succeed each other with deliberation and calm, not in haste and confusion. The evening talk after a day of fishing is apt to be memorable. The quiet thinking on the w^ay home is apt to be pleasant, delicious, sometimes even sacred.

I am not sure but that many anglers remember with more distinctness and delight their going home after days of sport than the sport itself. Certainly the strongest impressions on my own mind are of the last casts in the twilight, the counting of the day's results on the bank of lake or river, the homeward walk or ride, and, best of all, the welcome home. For the sportsman's home is where his heart is; and most earnestly do I recommend all lovers of the rod to find their sport, if they can do so, where they can be accompanied by wives and daughters, even by children. On this account, if on no other, every one

352 I GO A-FISHING.

must be glad to see the formation of clubs whose arrange- ments include accommodation for the families of members.

There is no more graceful and healthful accomplishment for a lady than fly-fishing, and there is no reason why a lady should not in every respect rival a gentleman in the gentle art.

Shall I ever forget a day along one of the Connecticut streams, of which I have spoken in this volume, when four of us — a lady, two boys, and myself — took a superb basket of trout, and the lady beat us all ? What a sur- prise it was when I saw her, far off across a meadow, standing alone, with her light rod bending as she gave the butt to a strong fish, to keep him from a last rush down the rapid ! I hastened to her assistance, but it was useless j for before I reached her he lay on the grass, two pounds and three quarters exactly, the noblest trout I ever saw taken from a Connecticut brook.

Make your home, therefore, as near as may be to your sport, so, at the least, that you may always find it when the day is done.

I have described in this book a mountain lake, among the Franconia hills, which is not known to many anglers. As I approach the last pages of the volume, I recall, from among a thousand scenes, with especial vividness, memo- ries of that lake. I could easily tell why these memories are so clear, but the reasons concern only myself, and all anglers have their peculiar reasons for best loving memo- ries of certain waters.

My last day's sport one summer ended with a glorious evening there. We — Dupont and myself — had recon- structed two old rafts of logs and brush, which we had abandoned once before as water-logged, but now found, floating indeed, but so deep that it was necessary to cut

FISHING UNDER DIFFICULTIES. 353

pine boughs and heap on them to give us footing out of water. The situation of the lake renders it very lovely, as well as very lonely. I have already described it.

It lies in a basin among lofty mountain-tops, and is itself some three thousand feet above the sea. The pine- fringed crests around form the edge of the basin, the slopes being an unbroken mass of forest, except on the north, where a huge, bare, rocky bluff rises about eight hundred feet into the air.

When the sun had disappeared behind the western mountain crest, the scene was exceedingly beautiful. The lonely pond was a mirror, all wind had gone down, and a soft darkness seemed to fill the basin in which it lay, while up above and down below the water, and all around us, sun-lit peaks were standing out in a clear blue sky.

I sat down on my floating island of pine boughs to watch Dupont — for I believe I am sincere in saying that I enjoy seeing another man throw a fly, if he is a good and graceful sportsman, quite as much as doing it myself; and there is no man's casting I like to see so well as my friend Dupont's. The lake was crowded with small fish, so that at every cast from one to a dozen would rise. They were four-ounce fish, capital for the table, but not what we wanted. At length, as he sent his tail fly over toward the lily pads, there came that swift rush and swirl in the water that is such music to the sportsman's ears, and then the slender Norris rod bent as two pounds of lively trout-flesh, fins and tail, were dragging it downward.

If you desire to know what is fishing under difficulties, try a light rod on a mountain pond, and cast from a log raft covered with pine boughs. Dupont's fish fought hard at a distance for a few minutes, then yielded to the steady pressure of the rod in a skillful hand, and came slowly in.

Z

354 I GO A- FISHING.

But when he saw what hurt him — that is, when he saw the humanity on the raft — he did just as a hundred fish in every hundred do, rushed for the only dark place in sight, and that was under the raft. Now remember, you who do not understand fly-fishing, that there were three flies on the casting-line, each four feet from the other, and the trout hooked on the middle one. What would be the natural effect of such a rush among the overhanging pine boughs ? Of course two hooks would make themselves fast somewhere, for a hook always finds solid attachment where it is not intended to catch. So Dupont watched his fish, and when, with a sharp rush, he tore off" the first bobber (which, my uneducated friend, means the upper fly, nearest the rod), succeeded in swinging him off so that his next rush loosened the tail fly, and then, con- vinced that the dark spot under the raft was full of ene- mies, the trout went away into deep water. Here it was easy work to bring him to the landing-net, and I lay on my pine-bough island and saw him come out, shining in gold and silver and jewels, and said, " A fine fish ! Now do it again." And he did it again and again, and the day went down almost into darkness, and we had forgotten the difficulties and dangers of the untrodden mountain- sides which we must cross on our way homeward.

The twilight lingered long up there, but we pushed our rafts to the shore in haste, and plunged into the forest. I think I have before alluded to our misadventure on this evening. We had traveled this route often enough to know it ; but this evening we missed the proper line at starting, and the effect of that little error well-nigh proved a very serious matter. For a divergence of a few rods at the commencement widened to a fourth of a mile by the time we reached the mountain-top, and instead of our

A BREAK -NECK DESCENT. 355

mossy descent — steep enough, but easy because we knew it — we found ourselves suddenly on the edge of a preci- pice. Below us the descent for full five hundred feet was a vast pile of rocks but a few degrees out from the per- pendicular. It was too late to turn back, for the night was already coming on. We had not fifteen minutes of twilight left. So we commenced the far irovn facilis descent. It was a break-neck or break-leg operation. Dropping from rock to rock, sliding down sharp inclines, catching here and there at branches of trees or shrubs that gave way with us and let us fall into holes among the stones, out of which we cHmbed, to fall again and again into similar openings — how we reached the bottom of that descent safely I can not imagine. At the moment we laughed at our scrape and scrapes, but when we reached more sure footing and a less precipitous slope of the mountain we paused for a long breath, and looked into each other's faces before we pushed on in the dense un- der-brush. An occasional look at the compass by the light of a match— for it was now dark — kept us on the right course— east half north — until we heard before us the welcome dash of the Pemigewasset over his rocky bed at the foot of the mountain. The road could not be far beyond it, and crossing the river on a fallen tree, we pressed on, and emerged at last, wuth no small satisfac- tion, on the track of civilization.

The silence which filled the valley at the foot of Mount Lafayette as we came into the clearing w\as oppressive. I never knew the forest so still. No bird, no insect, no living animal uttered a sound. There was no wind to move the trees. The voice of the river was inaudible, for it flows gently by this opening. I sat down by the road-side to sain breath, more exhausted by the descent

356 I GO A-FISHING.

than I had been by the ascent of the mountain. Up above us, between the tree-tops,, was a narrow Hne of sky, sprin- kled with bright stars, that shone as you have sometimes seen them on a winter night.

While we sat there a soft breeze from the south began to steal up the valley, and then, borne on the gentle air, I heard from far below the sound of the river vexed among rocks, and dashing down heavy falls, but the sound was not angry ; it was musical and mournful ; it was the sound of mingled praise and prayer in some dis- tant place of worship, as I have heard the great organ at Freiburg, when late at night I have been standing on the bridge over the chasm.

The horses were not waiting for us, though we were a half- hour beyond the appointed time. As we learned afterward, the boy who had been sent with them waited in the lonesome road until, in the gloom, the trunks of trees began to look like men, bushes became ghosts, stumps seemed to him wild beasts, and the darkness frightened him. So the poor little fellow, after resisting the terror that crept over him as long as he could, yielded at last, and drove home as fast as the horses would drag him. We had nothing to do but to foot it. It was no wonder the boy was frightened in that deep valley. As we walked up the road we several times saw groups of men ahead of us, which wholly vanished as we approached them. Once I saw a horse standing by the road-side, and Dupont saw it too, and we hurried on, thinking to find old Jack and the wagon, but there was no horse there ; only trunks of trees, and the starlight creeping through and around them.

Again we sat down for awhile on a great rock by the road-side, and listened, if we might perhaps hear the

THE MEMORY OF PRAYER. 357

coming wheels. But all was silent ; only that sound of the river came up the valley, like the murmur of many voices in prayer.

"It is as if all the dead that lie in the valley were praying together in some old church down yonder," said Dupont.

"Do you think there is very much dust of humanity here in the valley .'"'

" They say the earth's surface has been used for graves, so that the dead lie under every foot of ground."

" That's all nonsense. If all the men and women and children that have died on the earth from the creation till this day were gathered, living now, and the breath of the Lord should sweep them into Lake Superior, they might sink to the bottom and find ample space to lie side by side, and have plenty of room to turn if their slumber should be restless. If the judgment were set, and all mankind called to stand up and answer, they could be ranged within sound of a cannon. I don't think that many men lie in this valley. The dust of the earth that has been man is, after all, very little of it. It is not that which hallows ground so much as the memory of man's life and love and suffering, and approach to his God. Old places of worship are always full of sacred associa- tions. Even an old heathen temple is a very solemn place. How strange and sweet among our treasures are memories of prayer ! Did you never linger in an old ca- thedral after the vesper service, and find the atmosphere full of holy calm, as if the golden vials of the elders had not yet inclosed the prayers of that day ? If there be any thing which hallow^s ground on this poor earth of ours, it is that here or there man or woman or child has prayed. If I did not believe that little six feet of rock in the old

358 I GO A- FISHING.

church in Jerusalem to be the rock on which the feet of the Lord first rested when he awoke from the slumber of atonement, I would nevertheless revere it as the holi- est place on earth, because more knees have pressed it in penitential prayer than any other spot in all the world. It seems to me that much good paper and ink have been wasted of late in discussing this subject of prayer, and answering a queer proposition of some one who, wise in certain ways, is ignorant from lack of experience in this matter. I have great pity for the man whose life lacks this experience of prayer and its answers. For such a man, knowing nothing of the power of faith, is like a blind man who knows nothing of color. I would not at- tempt to explain it to him, for I could not. He can not understand the terms I use, nor can I explain them to him. He will never be wiser for any explanation of mine, nor until he meets the Master in the way, and is directed to some Siloam, where he may wash his eyes and see. Then he will know all about it. Meantime he laughs at me ; and I let him laugh, for it does me no harm. Strange that wagon does not come."

"This prospect of going home on foot is not just the thing after our experience on the mountain."

"No, not the thing at all, especially with a strained ankle."

"What, yours?"

" A little so, I fancy. But let's be moving."

So we walked along, I limping a little.

" Certainly this Is not what we bargained for. Where can that boy be ? I'm in a hurry to be at home. When home is bright and pleasant, it's never the thing to be going there slowly. We are always in a hurry when our faces are once set homeward. You and I have been

WALKING AND TALKING.

359

a-fishing in this world a good while, on all sorts of waters, and have taken more or less, in the main with quiet con- tentment. What is life, after all, but just going a-fishing all the time, casting flies on many rivers and lakes, and going quietly home as the day is ending?"

" Don't waste time with any more moralizing, Effendi. What we have before us is now to get ourselves home in as sound condition as possible."

" Well, can't we talk as we go along ? That's another of the similarities between life and a day's fishing; as we go home we like to talk, and generally to talk over the day's events. Your basket is heavy, but you carry it lightly, because you killed those large trout in the twi- light. If it had fewer trout in it, it would feel heavier. Life's work well done makes a light load to carry home."

" Is your basket heavy ?"

" To-night ? Yes. It's not half full, but I am half in- clined to empty it among the bushes. If it were not wast- ing the trout, I would. Here comes a wagon or a coach, or something — perhaps we can get a ride."

It was a late extra from Plymouth on the way to the Profile, and it was loaded to excess. There was scarcely room for our baskets of fish, and none for us. But the driver relieved us of our loads, and we plodded on.

" There you have a simile again. Any one will carry your earnings for you. Plenty of people go by you on the road of life ready and willing to relieve you of the re- sults of your labor, but they don't care to take you up and help you along."

"That's not fair. These people would have carried us along, but they had no room; and they took the trout in pure good-will, intending to restore them to us when we are at home."

360 I GO A -FISHING.

" Possibly — possibly — but there is a great deal of self- ishness in the world that we don't know of."

" Come, come Effendi — you are surly and cross. If you did break the second joint of your favorite rod on a three- ounce trout, you need not be in an ill humor with all the world because of it. Let's walk faster."

" Walk on alone, if you want to ; but I'm going to sit down on this rock and stay here till Jack comes, if it isn't till morning. My ankle won't stand any more."

And down I sat. One can't be always cheery; and somehow there came over me that evening a gloom that I could not at once shake off For, to say truth, I was thoroughly used up, and had strained my ankle badly in the plunge down the mountain. When one is weary, a slight ache is a serious impediment. Dupont yielded at last to my persuasions, or rather to his own conviction that I must be sent for if I were to get to the hotel that night, and so pushed on, leaving me alone in the forest.

The moon had by this time come up above the south- ern ridge of Mount Lafayette, and was pouring a flood of silver light into the valley of the Pemigewasset. The light stole down among the trees, scarcely reaching the ground any where, but producing that well-known effect of moonlight — the entire transformation of objects — so that there seemed to be life and even motion every where around me.

I lit a cigar and stretched myself out on the rock. Im- prudent ? Yes, but comfortable. The great trunks of trees around me began to look like the forest of columns in Karnak. I wondered whether it were really true that only a couple of miles from me at that instant were hun- dreds of people in a great hotel, representatives of the civilization of the century, gathered in a vast drawing-

AN ANCIENT LADY. 36 1

room, blazing with gas-light, brilliant dresses, jewelry, and all the adornments of modern life. It seemed odd to be lying on a rock in an old temple and yet so near to the modern world. I asked myself, are they after all very different people, that gay crowd at the Profile, from the men and women who thronged the old temple? We people of the nineteenth century are guilty of folly in our self-admiration, and vastly err in placing ourselves far in advance of all ages. Steam-engines and telegraphs and printing-presses are mighty powers, but the day and the place are far distant from which man will look back on this little world and judge impartially of the various evi- dences of various civilizations. Even now we can see bar- barism in our own governments, and in our own houses, if we will but look at ourselves. I doubt very much whether the Eg}'ptian lady from whose head I once took a curl of hair was not as refined, as civilized, as polished three thou- sand years ago as any lady in the Profile House to-night ? Here lies the curl before me as I write — a dark brown lock, which lights in the sun to-day as it lit when she was living ages ago. Her head was covered with curls. Be- fore they wrapped her face in the grave-clothes, loving fingers twined all the dark masses of her hair into just such curls as she loved to wear, speaking, we should say in our day, of youth, gayety, grace, and loveliness. For a curl speaks. Around it, as it lies there, is a halo, from which I can hear voices uttering many evidences of civil- ization. She lived in luxury; she wore purple and fine linen ; she had jewels on her fingers, and, though she never imitated the civilization of modern Africa, which wears rings in the nose, she was guilty of the barbarism of piercing holes in her ears whereon to hang gold and jewels to be looked at and admired.

362 I GO A -FISHING.

I never found the head of a dead woman in Egypt adorned with false hair, but I have seen abundant speci- mens of it from the tombs, where it had been laid with other ornaments, as if perchance it might be needed in the far-off morning. And this curl adorned a head which in life had every claim to civilization which any lady pos- sesses who may read these words, and those locks of hair have been seen in halls whose splendor surpassed our Western dreams, among statesmen and soldiers, from whom, if we could unseal their lips, we might learn les- sons of civilization unknown to us of the nineteenth cen- tury.

But what was that yonder in the forest which startled me so that I sat up on the rock and looked intently into the strange cross lights of the moon among the bushes ? Who was that, standing beyond the great column by the obelisk? and that? and that? Was it a breeze swaying the dogwood and moose-berry bushes, or were those ver- ily ghosts ? A weary fisherman, resting on his way home may well see visions in such a lonesome forest and such a moonlight. Face after face looked at me around that old column. It was the trunk of a mighty birch, but it looked more like the stone reared by Osirei. There was visible an old man's face. Alas, for the old man. The years that have been counted and stored away in God's memory and the memory of men since he departed, have made those once solemn and commanding features dust, while they have drawn these lines on mine. He was the guide of my boyhood, the beloved companion of my ma- turing years. His voice was exceedingly musical, as he read aloud to me his favorite passages in Homer, and bade me translate while he recited from memory the im- passioned eloquence of the Medea. He seemed to be

OLD FRIENDS. 363

wondering what his boy was doing there on that rock, his eyes flashing back the light out of his own. And while 1 sat there, he vanished and another stood in his place. Old Simon Gray, who taught me how to catch trout forty years ago, the good old friend of my childhood, looked around the column, and I caught the old smile on his face. How my heart leaped to see the good old man. How I longed to ask him if the chestnut locks of his beloved wife lay clustering on his breast in the land of his present abiding ! And though he spoke not a word, the old man knew my thoughts and answered me : " She is here, the beloved of olden times," and as he spoke she looked over his shoulder. It was strange, the contrast. I had never known her, for she died long before I was born, but I had often heard him speak of her young beauty, and now they stood before me. He was old, very old, and his white locks lay thin on his head, and the smiles of heaven rested among the deep harsh lines of sad age. But she was in her young, pure, matronly beauty; and her eye, blue as the skies of summer nights, and flashing as the stars, gleamed with a joy that can not be described. Her long curls of chestnut flowed over her neck and down her shoulders, like a river of rich, deep, magnificent beauty, through which glimpses of her temples seemed like diamonds. And she looked at the old man, and did not seem to think him old, but lovingly (how lovingly !) she laid her head on his shoulder, and wound her arms around his neck, and led him away out of sight. And when they were gone, for a little while there were only bushes swinging in the wind, and now and then the moan of a tree that had fallen against another, and complained as the rising wind moved it. And then, down the slope, among the trees, where a silver stream of water ran over rocks hastening toward

364 I GO A- FISHING.

the Pemigewasset, I saw a vision of exceeding loveliness, which you might have thought the rising mist above the water, but which revealed to me a face of rare and per- fect beauty ; and a smile of intense joy was on those matchless features, as if they had. brought with them a memory of the light of heaven. I could not count the years since the dust was heaped over those closed eyes now bright with the light of blessedness. I could not num- ber the moons that have waxed and waned since those lips, closed, close shut, were pressed with their last ca- resses. And now eyes and lips were smiling the lan- guage of heaven.

It w^as a vision of blessed days. I did not love Maud

. But my friend, my almost brother, did, and his

love was the adoration of boyhood. And she returned it. And if there be among the dark books which the record- ing angel has gathered in his fearful library, one. page of white glory, on that page will be found written in living letters, letters that will live forever, the story of that gold- en love. It perished ! Passed out of life, out of earth, out of the sun and moonshine of this lower world, but who dare say it passed not into some starry home, where God hath appointed his children to love on forever and for- ever ! aye, forever ! That is the word, written on the hu- man heart in letters of fire, of glory, or of agony.

They died on the same day, though a thousand miles apart. The whitest wings of the angels wafted her home- ward, and who shall tell the joy of meeting him there ! She was brilliant, starry in the splendor of her young pure beauty, and more brilliant, more starlike now, as she look- ed at me, and turned her face archly away with that smile on it as she looked back into the forest and seemed to say to me, " Yes, he is there /' and I gazed and gazed

GOING HOME. 365

into the forest, to see, if I could, my old friend, the hoy with whom I had fished the mountain brooks a hundred times in the sunniest days of life ; but I could not see him yet, and —

" What I asleep, Effendi ? Well, if you don't pay for this with all manner of aches and pains."

It was Dupont, returned with Jack and the buck-board, and he had found me sound asleep on the rock.

And as the good horse Jack went up the road at a tre- mendous rate, I failed to answer very clearly the ques- tions he put as to my folly in thus going to sleep in damp clothes on a rock in the open air. For I was thinking of home, and who would be there to welcome me.

"Better than walking this, isn't it, especially as the moon is clouded now ?"

" Yes, yes, on foot or in a wagon, it's pleasant anyhow to be going home. Always pleasant, when the work of the day is all done, when the sunlight of the day is no longer bright, nor the twilight soft and beautiful, when the darkness has settled down and we walk only by the light of stars.

"And there's no doubt about it, when one looks up yonder through the forest- road, through the tree -tops, through the gloom, and thinks of the far-off home and the waiting welcome — there's no mistake about it, my boy, one can't help wishing he might be sent for with swift horses."

THE END.

By W. C. Prime.

I 60 A-FISHING.

I Go a-Fishing. By William C. Pkime. Crown 8vo, ( 'lotli. Beveled Edges.

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