The pronoun I is the straightest letter in the alphabet; the only one independent of curves or angles for support; for this reason it is entitled to every man’s respect.
But I do not intend to enter into a defense of egotism at this writing; this is only to express a willingness to enter the lists should occasion demand, and to admonish the man who would deprecate egotism that he himself is full of that commendable weakness. I wish to give my experience, a very limited one, with rods.
An immediate change from a three pound plum bush pole to an esthetic split bamboo rod of a few ounces would drive a man crazy. It would be like putting a delicately turned Kirby into the hands of a pot hunter of the stone age. As the Kirby would compare with a bone sharpened at the ends, and a hole in the middle for the raw hide line, so the little bamboo with the plum bush. No doubt the prehistoric angler and his descendant of the nineteenth century would look, if they could, each upon the implements of the other with curiosity and utter lack of faith. But faith comes with education, and when the labor of learning is a labor of love, education becomes easy.
My experience with the plum bush was not satisfactory. Early in the “sixties,” depending on ox teams for bacon and flour, fishing rods were not counted as merchandise or articles of freight. Necessity therefore required, that, to indulge my liking, I must exert my skill, so that when I got back from Bear creek and my memorable first trouting, I made a rod; my first rod.
A piece of pine for the butt, cedar, straight grained and without flaw, for the second joint. A well selected hickory whip handle furnished the timber for a tip. A jack knife, glass and sand paper served for tools; and excellent tools they are with patience for capital.
I shall not say how many days I exhausted in working up those three sticks into satisfactory shape.
As to mounting, I had neither tools or metal, nor the genius of Tubal Cain, so I applied to a tinker of watches, made known my difficulty, and he fitted me out with two sets of ferrules and half a dozen guide rings for the modest sum of seven dollars in gold dust.
Drug stores and whisky shops get to the frontier with equal facility, so there was no scarcity of oil, shellac and alcohol. The wrapping of the rings was followed by the oil and shellac, and when I strung that rod together, and, in the privacy of our cabin, submitted it to the inspection of the madam, it was pronounced “just perfect.”
The verdict was no less delightful than the rod and the jury of one.
During the winter that marvel of excellence and beauty was subjected to weekly examinations and comment. The anticipated pleasures of the coming summer, because we were “both going,” were the prime subjects of evening conversations over the kitchen stove. There never had been, nor could there ever be, vouchsafed to any other couple the amount of enjoyment banked up and ready to draw upon, than was stored away during that memorable winter, and the rod was the pole star, so to speak. Everything pointed to that. But disappointments make life worth living; while they are sometimes severe, there is yet a genuine pleasure in setting one’s foot on their necks.