d.

"All right?" asked R----, impatient to begin.

"Yes, all right," replied P----; and away the pram, borne by the
thousand intertwining currents, shot with R----.

The high peaks of the mountains now began to shine in the rising sun,
and, like the ebbing surface of an ocean, the line of light gradually
descended towards the valley. One by one, the cattle came forth from
their sheds; and the cock, flapping his wing, stood a tip-toe, and crew
most lustily. Under the weather-vane, on the farm-house roof, the
pigeons trimmed their feathers, and cooed. Unfelt the coolness of the
morning air, (for they were hot with exertion,) and regardless of moving
shadows, or cooing doves, my two friends gave up the sense of hearing to
their reels, and that of seeing to the career of the little zinc hooks
at the end of their gut lines. When I looked at the insular P----, and
his active rod, I thought him like to Archimedes who had found his
extramundane spot of ground, and, as he threw the fly, and bent his back
to let it touch the water lightly, was endeavouring to fasten his lever
to the base of the adjacent mountain in order to consummate his wish of
raising the world; and the circumfluous R---- with his long tackle, that
hissed when he cast it with the petulance of an angry switch, appeared
an ocean god, who had selected a shorter route to the North Cape by the
Toptdal River, and was urging his reluctant grampuses up the cataract.

R---- and P---- might have angled for five hours, and the result of
their assiduity was as diverse as pain is to pleasure, whatever the
Stoics may have said to the contrary; for P---- caught fifteen salmon,
and R---- not one. Disappointed, no doubt, that such trifling profit
should succeed to so much labour, R---- wound up his ten or twelve
yards of cat-gut, and desired the boatmen to row ashore. It was now
eight o'clock; and when people rise at two in the morning, it does not
require much calculation to tell how keen the appetite must become when
it has grumbled five hours in vain for aliment. P----, however, was
callous to hunger, or thirst; and as he made capture after capture, all
thought of food decreased in an inverse ratio. When R---- had alighted
from the pram, the boatman drew it up on the shore, lest it should get
adrift, for it was the only available pram at Boom; and touching his
slouch hat, signified to R---- his intention of going to his morning
meal. R---- consented. We sat down on a pie