The boy said he thought that name would just suit me, and from that day to this I have been known by every one who is acquainted with me as “Old Durability”.
Having introduced myself, because there was no one to perform the ceremony for me, and told you how I came by my cognomen, I will now go back and relate how I made the acquaintance of my master, Joe Wayring.
If you will review your own life, boy reader, you may be able to find in it some incident, which happened, perhaps, long before you were out of pinafores, and which you remember perfectly, while all your life previous to the occurrence of that particular incident is a blank to you. Just so it was in my own experience. When I first came to my senses, I found myself snugly tied up in my case and standing in a corner, looking through a glass door into a large store in which guns of all makes and fishing tackle of all kinds were kept for sale. At first I was greatly bewildered. I felt, if I may judge from what I have seen during my trips to the woods, like a boy who has just awakened from a sound sleep; but after a while my wits came to me, and then I found that I was not alone in the show-case. There were a dozen or two fly and bait rods standing in the corner beside me, and a little further down, looking toward the back end of the store, were single and double-barreled shot-guns, muzzle and breech-loading rifles, game-bags, creels, hunting knives, dog-whips, and almost every thing else that a sportsman is supposed to need. In the show-case, which rested on the long counter in front of me, were revolvers, pen-knives, lines, leaders, flies and ordinary fish-hooks without number; and on the opposite side of the store was an array of barrels containing glass balls, traps for throwing those balls, bicycles, tricycles, rowing and lifting machines—in fact, I saw so many things that I did not then know the name or use of, that I became confused while I looked at them.
“Hallo, there! Have you waked up at last?” cried a voice, breaking in upon my meditations.
A short investigation showed that the voice came from the case that stood next on my right. I did not know, of course, what sort of a rod he was, or whether or not he would prove to be an agreeable acquaintance; but wishing to be civil, I replied that I had waked up, and that, if he could tell me, I should be glad to know where I was and how I came there.
“Why, you are in a one-horse country town, a thousand miles from nowhere, and you have always been here,” was the answer, given as I thought in a tone of contempt. “I have traveled. I came all the way from New York.”
“Who are you?” I ventured to ask; for my new acquaintance spoke in so dignified and lofty a tone, that I stood somewhat in awe of him.
“I am a split bamboo,” said he; and then I saw very clearly that he was disposed to throw on airs, and to lord it over those who were not as fortunate as himself. “I am a gentleman’s rod, and it takes the ducats to buy me. I am worth forty-five dollars; while I see by the card tied to your case, that you are valued at only six and a half.”
Not being quick at figures at this early period of my life, I could not tell just how much difference there was between forty-five dollars and six and a half, but I knew by the way the bamboo spoke, that the gulf that separated him from me was a wide one. I have learned some things since then. I know now that the qualities of a fly-rod do not depend upon the varnish that is put on the outside of him, any more than a boy’s qualities of mind and heart depend upon the clothes he wears. The stuff he is made of and the company he keeps have much to do with the record he makes in the world. While I was turning the matter over in my mind, somebody who had been listening to our conversation, suddenly broke in with:
“You are neither one of you worth the money you cost.”