Part 19

"Wade." But this he was averse to doing. He found a log of wood, and pushing it out beyond the bushes, where it was very shallow, he took his stand upon it in a very wobbley state, with a rod in either hand. I took up a position a short distance from him, and we waited patiently for half an hour without a bite. Suddenly I heard a splash, and looking round, saw that A. had slipped off his perch, and was halfway up to his knees in water, with a broken rod and a most rueful expression on his face.

"I have lost such a beauty."

"Serves you right. You can't pitch a big carp out like you could a trout. This is the way--see."

I struck at a decided bite, and found that I was fast in a good fish, which, after a lively bit of splashing and dashing about (the water was only knee-deep, though so muddy the fish could not see us), I led into a little haven or pond, where the inmates of a cottage in the wood came to get their water, and lifted him out with my hands--a tidy fish of three pounds in weight. In about a quarter of an hour A.'s float moved slightly. He was all excitement directly. He had never caught anything larger than a half-pound trout. Some minutes elapsed before another movement took place.

"He has left it," said A.

"No, he has not. Don't move; you will get him presently."

Then the float or quill gave a couple of dips; then in a few seconds more moved off with increasing rapidity. "Now strike." A. did so, and soon landed a carp of two pounds. From that time we had steady sport throughout the day. Every quarter of an hour one of us had a bite; and although we missed a good many through striking too soon, our respective heaps of golden-brown fish (very few of the carp there are at all white) grew rapidly in size.

As we were coming back from a small larch-tree where we had found a beautifully constructed golden-crested wren's nest, suspended from the under side of a branch, A. suddenly clasped me round the middle, and gave me a very neat back throw.

"Hullo! what's that for?" I exclaimed, considerably astonished as I sat on the ground.

"Your foot was just poised over that beggar," he said, pointing to a big brown adder, which was gliding away like an animated ash-stick.

"Ah, thanks; there are too many of those fellows here."

We had eaten the two pies, and as four o'clock drew near we got mighty hungry again.

"Just hand me over another pie, old fellow, Nature abhors a vacuum," said A.

"I haven't got any more," I answered.

"Not got any more? O dear!" After a pause, "I am hungry." In a little while longer A. started off, saying, "You mind my rod while I am away. I am going foraging for food. I'll try and catch a rabbit, and eat him alive, oh! I've been meditating upon those fish, but I don't like the look of them."

He was gone for about half an hour, during which time I had landed three fish. When he came back he had the countenance of a man who had dined well. He said to me,

"Go as straight as you can through the wood in that direction, and you will come to a cottage where there is plenty of hot tea, a loaf of bread, and some butter awaiting you. I never dined better in all my life, and I forgive you for only bringing two pies."

I obeyed his directions, and the tea certainly was refreshing, although I could not get any sugar with it.

It was time to be going. We counted our fish. I had eleven (my usual number at that pool, by the way), and A. had ten, most from two to three pounds each, but one or two heavier. We selected the best, and as many as we could conveniently carry, and gave the rest to some cottagers.

From the shooting-box, which is at the top of the hill, and is, by the way, in a state of dilapidation, we had a most magnificent view, one well worth the walk to see. It was a view which embraced Shropshire, Cheshire, Montgomeryshire, Denbighshire, and Merionethshire. In the vividly green valley below us the little village of Llansilin slumbered, scarcely noticeable were it not for the dark and massy yew-trees in its churchyard.

From the rocks farther on we saw a pretty sight. A fox was standing on a stone, and on a sloping slab beneath her five cubs were sprawling and gambolling about like a lot of Newfoundland puppies.

Presently the vixen trotted off a little way and lay down; and while we were watching her a rabbit popped out of his burrow, and came several yards towards Reynard without seeing her. With one bound fox was upon bunny, and the pair rolled over and over down the hill. The captor then slunk off with her captive, not to her young ones, but to a quiet hole in the cliff, to have a gorge all by her greedy self.

In a hollow tree in the cliff we found three jackdaws' nests, each with four eggs in; and we were amused at watching a woodpecker tapping away at a tree. The noise produced was like that made by drawing a stick very rapidly over some wooden palings, and quite as loud, or even more like a watchman's rattle worked rather slowly. A curious spectacle was presented in the lane on going home. It was a warm damp night, and every dozen yards or so a glowworm exhibited its eerie light, and each successive one seemed to shine more whitely and brightly than the last.

The day was done, its pleasure seized, and--no, not gone, for a pleasant memory remains wherewith to delight myself, and perchance please my friends, among whom I would fain number all angling readers.

NEWMARKET

BY CAPTAIN R. BIRD THOMPSON

Newmarket is termed, and justly so, the metropolis of racing, but a greater contrast than Newmarket presents during the race-weeks and the rest of the year can scarcely be imagined. Any one who stood on the top of the hill on the Cambridge road, and looked down the main street, in one of the off-weeks, would think that he had hardly ever seen such a desolate forsaken-looking sort of place; the only living things to be seen being a few old women standing at the corners of the streets scratching their elbows, and two or three lads lounging about. Occasionally a tradesman will come out of his shop, and, after looking disconsolately up and down the street, will go and look into his own shop-window; his idea being, I suppose, either to see if he can dress his window more attractively, or that he would rather stare into his own shop-window than that nobody at all should; and the only way you would discover you were in a great racing district would be that you might see a string of sheeted racers passing through the street on their way from their training-grounds to their stables; or if you listened to the old women's or lads' conversation you would hear nothing but about some of the numerous trainers' "lots." The number of empty houses, too, and the bills of auction sales you see posted up everywhere with "In re" So-and-so in the corner, or "By order of the Sheriff," add to the desolateness of the scene. But during the race-weeks all this is altered, and the scene is as exciting and enlivening as it was dull before; the pavements crowded with men, two huge masses on each side, at the Rooms and White Hart, reminding one strongly of the way bees hang out of their hives previous to swarming. The inhabitants, too, erect stalls down both sides of the street, where all sorts of things are exposed for sale--fruit and vegetables of every kind, and amongst these hampers of a curious vegetable believed by the aborigines to be cucumbers, but to an uninstructed eye looking like a cross between a pumpkin and a hedgehog, so yellow and prickly are they; large baskets of mushrooms, those esculents which once cost the late Lord George Bentinck so dearly, and which he ever after cursed so heartily. There are stalls also where clothes and boots are sold, besides others where very dubious-looking confectionery is dealt in, and one I saw which had plates of yellow snail-looking things for sale. I do not know whether racegoers are supposed to eat these things, but if they do they must have uncommonly strong stomachs.

Vehicles of every sort and shape are plying for hire in the street, all of that wonderful kind that seem peculiar to race-meetings, regattas, &c., and which fill a person with wonder to think where they could have been made, and what they were originally intended for. Newmarket is, indeed, worth seeing on the morning of one of the big days, like the Cambridgeshire, to form any idea of the enormous multitude of people attending. It is well worth while to get into the stand at the end of the Rowley Mile as soon as you can, and a most wonderful sight it is to see the huge and incessant mass of people pouring down the side of the course from the old stand; one unbroken stream, many yards wide, and apparently never ending, yet perfectly quiet and orderly; no rough horseplay or rowdyism; composed of men who come for racing, and nothing else. An almost equally large string of vehicles pours down the road, the full ones getting along as fast as they can manage, and those that have discharged their loads galloping back in hopes of fresh fares. The natural idea of anyone attending for the first time is that there will be an awful crush; but such is the excellence of Newmarket as a racecourse that there is none whatever, and every one, either on foot or in the stand, can see every race from start to finish, with the exception of those run on the Cesarewitch course, and then no one can see the horses until they come into the straight, with the exception of a bare sight of the start, and a glimpse of them as they pass the Gap, which may be caught by keen-eyed people in the stand. It is really extraordinary to see how the immense crowd that you behold coming seems to dissipate, so that there does not appear to be any very great multitude of people until the races are over, and you turn home; then you see how enormous the numbers have been, there being a complete block of people from the course right through the town, and even up to the station.