d of the brook--what could the fish do but
come to her? Happy trout!'

'I am afraid he feels very much like a fish out of water,
nevertheless,' said Wych Hazel, eyeing her prize and her line
with a demure face.

Alas! it was the beginning and ending of their good fortune
for some time. Mr. Simms went back to his place; Mr. Lasalle
disengaged the fish and rearranged the bait; and all four fell
to work, or to watching, with renewed animation; but in vain.
The rods kept their angle of suspension, unless when a tired
arm moved up or down; the fishers' eyes gazed at the lines;
the water went running by with a dance and a laugh; the fish
laughed too, perhaps; the anglers did not. There were spicy
wood smells, soft wood flutter and flap of leaves, stealing
and playing sunbeams among the leaves and the tree stems; but
there was too much Society around the brook, and nobody heeded
all these things.

'Well, what success?' said Mme. Lasalle coming up after a
while. 'What have you caught? One little fish! Poor little
thing! Is that all? Well, it's luncheon time. Lasalle, I wish
you'd go and see that everybody is happy at the lower end of
the line; and I'll do your fishing meanwhile. Oh, Simms has
almost killed me! Stuart! do take charge of that basket, will
you?'

Mr. Nightingale receiving the basket from the hands of a
servant, inquired of his aunt what he was to do with it.

'Mercy! open it and give us all something--I am as hungry as I
can be. What have you all been doing that you haven't caught
more fish? My dear,' (to Wych Hazel), 'that is all you will
get till we go home; we came out to work to-day.'

And Stuart coming up, relieved her of her fishing rod, found a
pleasant seat on a mossy stone, and opened his basket.

'As the fish won't bite--Miss Kennedy, will you?'

'If you please,' she said, taking a new view from her new
position. 'How beautiful everything is to-day! Certainly I
have learned something about brooks.'

'And something about fishing?'

'Not much.'

'The best thing about fishing,' said Stuart, after serving the
other ladies and coming back to her, 'is that it gives one an
appetite.'

'Oh, then you have not studied the brook.'

'Certainly not,' said he, laughing, 'or only as one studies a
dictionary--to see what one can get out of it. Please tell me,
what did you?'

'New thoughts,' she said. 'And new fancies. And shadows, and
colours. I forgot all about the fish sometimes.'

'You are a