e trees standing in the hollow which
became the bed of the Reservoir, and these died when the water was let
in around them, and gave the stretch of quiet waters a strange, weird
look; about their bases was the best kind of place for sunfish, and even
for bass. Of course the boys never caught any bass; that honor was
reserved for men of the kind I have mentioned. It was several years
before the catfish got in, and then they were mud-cats; but the boys had
great luck with sunfish there and in the pools about the flood-gates,
where there was always some leakage, and where my boy once caught a
whole string of live fish which had got away from some other boy,
perhaps weeks before; they were all swimming about, in a lively way, and
the largest hungrily took his bait. The great pleasure of fishing in
these pools was that the waters were so clear you could see the fat,
gleaming fellows at the bottom, nosing round your hook, and going off
and coming back several times before they made up their minds to bite.
It seems now impossible that my boy could ever have taken pleasure in
the capture of these poor creatures. I know that there are grown people,
and very good, kind men, too, who defend and celebrate the sport, and
value themselves on their skill in it; but I think it tolerable only in
boys, who are cruel because they are thoughtless. It is not probable
that any lower organism

"In corporal sufferance feels a pang as great
As when a giant dies,"

but still, I believe that even a fish knows a dumb agony from the barbs
of the hook which would take somewhat from the captor's joy if he could
but realize it.

[Illustration: "THAT HONOR WAS RESERVED FOR MEN OF THE KIND I HAVE
MENTIONED."]

There was, of course, a time when the Hydraulic and the Reservoirs were
not where they afterwards appeared always to have been. My boy could
dimly recall the day when the water was first let into the Hydraulic,
and the little fellows ran along its sides to keep abreast of the
current, as they easily could; and he could see more vividly the tumult
which a break in the embankment of the Little Reservoir caused. The
whole town rushed to the spot, or at least all the boys in it did, and a
great force of men besides, with shovels and wheelbarrows, and bundles
of brush and straw, and heavy logs, and heaped them into the crevasse,
and piled earth on them. The men threw off their coats and all joined in
the work; a great local po