the hold. Presently I saw a place in the rocks
where I thought it possible, with such an incentive, to get down within
reach of the water: by careful manoeuvring I slipped my pole behind me
and got hold of the line, which I cut and wound around my finger; then
I made my way toward the end of the log and the place in the rocks,
leading my fish along much exhausted on the top of the water. By an
effort worthy the occasion I got down within reach of the fish, and, as
I have already confessed, thrust my thumb into his mouth and pinched
his cheek; he made a spring and was free from my hand and the hook at
the same time; for a moment he lay panting on the top of the water,
then, recovering himself slowly, made his way down through the clear,
cruel element beyond all hope of recapture. My blind impulse to follow
and try to seize him was very strong, but I kept my hold and peered and
peered long after the fish was lost to view, then looked my
mortification in the face and laughed a bitter laugh.

"But, hang it! I had all the fun of catching the fish, and only miss
the pleasure of eating him, which at this time would not be great."

"The fun, I take it," said my soldier, "is in triumphing, and not in
being beaten at the last."

"Well, have it so; but I would not exchange those ten or fifteen
minutes with that trout for the tame two hours you have spent in
catching that string of thirty. To see a big fish after days of small
fry is an event; to have a jump from one is a glimpse of the
sportsman's paradise; and to hook one, and actually have him under your
control for ten minutes,--why, that is paradise itself as long as it
lasts."

One day I went down to the house of a settler a mill below, and engaged
the good dame to make us a couple of loaves of bread, and in the
evening we went down after them. How elastic and exhilarating the walk
was through the cool, transparent shadows! The sun was gilding the
mountains, and its yellow light seemed to be reflected through all the
woods. At one point we looked through and along a valley of deep shadow
upon a broad sweep of mountain quite near and densely clothed with
woods, flooded from base to summit by the setting sun. It was a wild,
memorable scene. What power and effectiveness in Nature, I thought, and
how rarely an artist catches her touch! Looking down upon or squarely
into a mountain covered with a heavy growth of birch and maple, and
shone upon by the sun, is a sight peculiarly