“For trout,” replied Kenelm; “I dare say. A strangely attractive spot indeed.”
“Are you an angler, sir, if I may make bold to inquire?” asked the elderly man, somewhat perhaps puzzled as to the rank of the stranger; noticing, on the one hand, his dress and his mien, on the other, slung to his shoulders, the worn and shabby knapsack which Kenelm had carried, at home and abroad, the preceding year.
“Ay, I am an angler.”
“Then this is the best place in the whole stream. Look, sir, there is Izaak Walton’s summer-house; and further down you see that white, neat-looking house. Well, that is my house, sir, and I have an apartment which I let to gentleman anglers. It is generally occupied throughout the summer months. I expect every day to have a letter to engage it, but it is vacant now. A very nice apartment, sir,—sitting-room and bedroom.”
“Descende ceolo, et dic age tibia,” said Kenelm.
“Sir?” said the elderly man.
“I beg you ten thousand pardons. I have had the misfortune to have been at the university, and to have learned a little Latin, which sometimes comes back very inopportunely. But, speaking in plain English, what I meant to say is this: I invoked the Muse to descend from heaven and bring with her—the original says a fife, but I meant—a fishing-rod. I should think your apartment would suit me exactly; pray show it to me.”
“With the greatest pleasure,” said the elderly man. “The Muse need not bring a fishing-rod! we have all sorts of tackle at your service, and a boat too, if you care for that. The stream hereabouts is so shallow and narrow that a boat is of little use till you get farther down.”
“I don’t want to get farther down; but should I want to get to the opposite bank, without wading across, would the boat take me or is there a bridge?”
“The boat can take you. It is a flat-bottomed punt, and there is a bridge too for foot-passengers, just opposite my house; and between this and Moleswich, where the stream widens, there is a ferry. The stone bridge for traffic is at the farther end of the town.”