nary brilliancy. His vigorous, wholesome, seasoned
muscles propelled him irresistibly against the current of the river,
which was now fierce with freshet; and being urged by a stronger and
more insistent desire than that which had swayed him on his former
visit, as a grilse, he now made more haste in his journeying, with
briefer halts in the pools. The pools, at this season, were some of them
indistinguishable in the flood, and others turbulent and difficult of
access, so the fly-fishermen were not yet out in force. Only once, in
the great pool below the Quahdavic mouth, did he see the bright fly
whose treacherous lure he knew so well go dancing over his head. He rose
lazily and slapped it with his tail in angry contempt, then returned to
the bottom of the pool and watched it lazily, while for nearly an hour
it went through its futile antics. Then it vanished suddenly.

Perhaps ten minutes after the gaudy fly had disappeared, the big salmon
saw a brown furry shape, more like a very young squirrel than anything
else, go floating down the current. Other salmon, who, like himself,
had ignored the fly, observed this furry shape with interest, and half
started to investigate. But when the big salmon rose to it they turned
away with resignation. As for him, though he had not been once really
hungry since entering the fresh water, he felt that that strange object
was the very thing he wanted. Gliding up to the surface on a long slant,
very slowly, he opened his great jaws just below the object, sucked it
in, and with a heavy splash turned back toward the bottom. The next
instant there was a jerk, a prick, a fierce tug at his jaw which swerved
him from his course; and he realized that he had been fooled. The furry
shape was but the old treason of the fly in another form.

His first impulse was to rush madly across the pool in an effort to
escape the small tormentor. But memory and experience, added to that
native cunning which had brought him safely through so many perils, now
came to his rescue. Instead of rushing to the surface and performing
wild feats which would have soon worn him out while delighting the soul
of his enemy, he turned resolutely back to his course and bored his way
to the bottom against the exasperating pressure of rod and reel. Here
he set himself to nosing vigorously among the stones, in the hope of
rubbing off this troublesome thing on his jaw. The thing tugged, and
tugged, and pricked, and worried, as t