would
meet for the opening of the season for the edification of Patissot, who
was delighted to have found such an experienced instructor.

FISHING EXCURSION

The day before the one when he was, for the first time in his life,
to throw a hook into a river, Monsieur Patissot bought, for eighty
centimes, "How to Become a Perfect Fisherman." In this work he learned
many useful things, but he was especially impressed by the style, and he
retained the following passage:

"In a word, if you wish, without books, without rules, to fish
successfully, to the left or to the right, up or down stream, in the
masterly manner that halts at no difficulty, then fish before, during
and after a storm, when the clouds break and the sky is streaked with
lightning, when the earth shakes with the grumbling thunder; it is then
that, either through hunger or terror, all the fish forget their habits
in a turbulent flight.

"In this confusion follow or neglect all favorable signs, and just go on
fishing; you will march to victory!"

In order to catch fish of all sizes, he bought three well-perfected
poles, made to be used as a cane in the city, which, on the river,
could be transformed into a fishing rod by a simple jerk. He bought some
number fifteen hooks for gudgeon, number twelve for bream, and with
his number seven he expected to fill his basket with carp. He bought no
earth worms because he was sure of finding them everywhere; but he laid
in a provision of sand worms. He had a jar full of them, and in the
evening he watched them with interest. The hideous creatures swarmed
in their bath of bran as they do in putrid meat. Patissot wished to
practice baiting his hook. He took up one with disgust, but he had
hardly placed the curved steel point against it when it split open.
Twenty times he repeated this without success, and he might have
continued all night had he not feared to exhaust his supply of vermin.

He left by the first train. The station was full of people equipped with
fishing lines. Some, like Patissot's, looked like simple bamboo canes;
others, in one piece, pointed their slender ends to the skies. They
looked like a forest of slender sticks, which mingled and clashed like
swords or swayed like masts over an ocean of broad-brimmed straw hats.

When the train started fishing rods could be seen sticking out of all
the windows and doors, giving to the train the appearance of a huge,
bristly caterpillar winding t