, thus early in the
game. The whole course, nearly a mile, is frequently made in a
little over a minute and a quarter.

All this is fine to see, without doubt, and finer still to do, but
do you know, if I could have my choice and could see but one, I
would choose to see that leviathan double-runner of a half-century
ago swinging the curve at Captain Bill Tucker's corner, followed
by that big wood-sled with the half of Ponkapoag's population on
it, and hear the joyous Yankee shouts as they resounded all the
way from the crest of the hill to George B.'s blacksmith shop.

CHAPTER XXV

PICKEREL FISHING

I rarely know where the pickerel fishermen come from. They seem to
be a race apart and their talk is not of towns or politics, of
business or religion. Neither love nor war is their theme, but ice
and fishing through it, and what happens to a man while so doing.
If I suggest Randolph, or Framingham, Wellesley or Weymouth, they
know them, perchance, as places where such and such ponds have a
depth that is known to them and ice on which they have had
adventures which they can detail. Those things for which the towns
stand characterized in the minds of most men are nothing to them,
but rather what bait may be found in their streams or what fish
may be drawn through the ice in their territory. On days when I
talk with them Boston centres about the Quincy Market, where bait
is sold and pickerel are displayed, and the sporting goods stores,
the merits of whose tackle are known to a nicety. Thus are worlds
multiplied to infinity, each one of us having his own. But to step
into that of the pickerel fishermen of a midwinter day adds zest
to the excursion.

They are quite like the juncos, to me, these genial men of the
frozen day. They suddenly appear from I know not where, share the
joys of the day and place for a brief time, then walk off the ice
again with their traps, going I know not whither. The next day in
all probability, if it be a good one for fishing, others will come
to fish in the same places and in the same way, but not usually
the same men. Thus the winter wandering birds appear, take their
toll of the day and the earth on which it shines, give the joy of
their presence to all who seek it understandingly, then vanish. It
would seem as if the pickerel fishermen were a distinct species,
like the tree sparrows and the pine grosbeaks, winter visitors not
to be looked for in warm weather, folk who pass from p