rade had been faring, and did not meet him again till they were in
the throat of the lane cottage-wards bound. "Well, old 'un; what luck
with the paternoster?" he asked, cheerily. M., with a sly twinkle in
the eye, said, yes, he had done somewhat; three pike. It may be
premised that the young men had both been trying at intervals for a
certain marauding pike reported to them as a ferocious duck destroyer
by a gentleman farmer who came down to gossip. He indicated the field
and a gravel pit as a guide to the place where his cowman had seen a
duckling seized by a pike, and the man embellished his account by
swearing that the fish had ploughed his way down the river half out of
water, with the ball of feathers bewhiskering his jaws. Manford, it
seems, had revenged the raided ducks. A large pike lay at the bottom
of his rush basket underneath three jack and a covering of rushes, and
it was produced as a crowning show, a golden fish of 17 lb. lured to
execution by a live bait. There was talk of nothing else that night
but this prize at keeper's cottage, village tap-room, at the lockheads,
and by five-barred gates; and the exultant keeper, who took credit for
all, was heard to say that it was the best bloomin' jack he had seen
"for seven year come last plum blight," whenever and whatever that
might be.

CHAPTER III

MAYFLY DAYS AND DIALOGUES

[SCENE: straw-roofed fishing-hut, door and windows wide open. Table
covered with remnants of luncheon, floor ditto with mineral water and
other bottles, very empty. In the shade outside, fishermen lying on
the grass gazing at the river, upon which the sun strikes fiercely.
Keeper and keeper's boys standing sentinel up and down the meadow,
under orders to report the first appearance of mayfly. Heat intense.
Swallows hawking over the water. Fields a sheet of yellow buttercups,
with faint lilac lines formed by cuckoo-flowers on the margins of
carriers and ditches. Much yawning and silence amongst the lazy
sportsmen sprawling in a variety of attitudes; caps thrown off their
sun-scorched faces, waders peeled down to the ankles.]

R. O. (the Riparian Owner, and host of the party): Well, it's about
time, I fancy, something stirred. The fly was up an hour before this
yesterday, and it would be naturally a little later to-day.

SUFFIELD (a barrister of repute, tall and thin, sarcastic, and a
first-rate angler): I don't believe we shall see a fly till three
o'clock, and th