The Project Gutenberg eBook, Fishing with a Worm, by Bliss Perry

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Title: Fishing with a Worm

Author: Bliss Perry

Release Date: July 27, 2005 [eBook #16369]

Language: English

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FISHING WITH A WORM

by

BLISS PERRY

Boston and New York
Houghton Mifflin Company

MDCCCCXVI

FISHING WITH A WORM

"The last fish I caught was with a worm."--IZAAK WALTON.

A defective logic is the born fisherman's portion. He is a pattern of
inconsistency. He does the things which he ought not to do, and he
leaves undone the things which other people think he ought to do. He
observes the wind when he should be sowing, and he regards the clouds,
with temptation tugging familiarly at his heartstrings, when he might
be grasping the useful sickle. It is a wonder that there is so much
health in him. A sorrowing political economist remarked to me in early
boyhood, as a jolly red-bearded neighbor, followed by an abnormally fat
dog, sauntered past us for his nooning: "That man is the best carpenter
in town, but he will leave the most important job whenever he wants to
go fishing." I stared at the sinful carpenter, who swung along
leisurely in the May sunshine, keeping just ahead of his dog. To leave
one's job in order to go fishing! How illogical!

Years bring the reconciling mind. The world grows big enough to include
within its scheme both the instructive political economist and the
truant mechanic. But that trick of truly logical behavior seems harder
to the man than to the child. For example, I climbed up to my den under
the eaves last night--a sour, black sea-fog lying all about, and the
December sleet crackling against the window-panes--in order to varnish
a certain fly-rod.