I was there for life. Nothing would ever take me back
over that ledge.
However, I was there, and there was no use wasting time. For there were
fish there. Now and then they jumped. But they did not take the fly. The
water seethed and boiled, and I stood still and fished, because a slip
on that spray-covered ledge and I was gone, to be washed down to Lake
Chelan, and lie below sea-level in the Cascade Mountains. Which might be
a glorious sort of tomb, but it did not appeal to me.
I tried different flies with no result. At last, with a weighted line
and a fish's eye, I got my first fish--the best of the day, and from
that time on I forgot the danger.
Some day, armed with every enticement known to the fisherman, I am going
back to that river. For there, under a log, lurks the wiliest trout I
have ever encountered. In full view he stayed during the entire time of
my sojourn. He came up to the fly, leaped over it, made faces at it.
Then he would look up at me scornfully.
[Illustration: _Stream fishing_]
"Old tricks," he seemed to say. "Old stuff--not good enough.
Pages:
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141