“This feller pretty slow,” he said, indicating Polly with a jerk of his thumb. “You all waitin’ for tackle?”
“Rather,” said Jim. “Never mind, we’ve got everything ready. Look sharp and shy down the hooks, Billy—they’re in that tin, and the lines are tied on to it, in a parcel. That’s right,” as the black boy tossed the tackle down and he caught it deftly. “Now, you chaps, get to work, and get your lines ready.”
“Right oh!” said the chorus, as it fell to work. Billy made a swift incursion into the interior of the pack, and fished up a tin of worms and some raw meat, Wally being the only one to patronize the latter. The other three baited their hooks with worms, and, all being in readiness, made their way down the steep bank at a place where a little cleft gave easier access to a tiny shelving beach below. Here a great tree-trunk had long ago been left by an unusually high flood, and formed a splendid place to fish from, as it jutted out for some distance over the stream. Norah scrambled out like a cat to its farthest extremity, and Harry followed her for part of the way. Wally and Jim settled themselves at intervals along the trunk. Sinkers, floats and baits were examined, and the business of the day began.
Everybody knows how it feels to fish. You throw in your hook with such blissful certainty that no fish can possibly resist the temptation you are dangling before its eyes. There is suppressed excitement all over you. You are all on the alert, feeling for imaginary nibbles, for bites that are not there. Sometimes, of course, the dreams come true, and the bites are realities; but these occasions are sadly outnumbered by the times when you keep on feeling and bobbing your line vainly, while excitement lulls to expectation, and expectation merges into hope, and hope becomes wishing, and wishing often dies down to disappointment.
Such was the gradual fate of the fishing party at Anglers’ Bend. At first the four floats were watched with an intensity of regard that should surely have had some effect in luring fishes to the surface; but as the minutes dragged by and not a fish seemed inclined even to nibble, the solemn silence which had brooded on the quartet was broken by sundry fidgetings and wrigglings and suppressed remarks on the variableness of fish and the slowness of fishing. Men enjoy the sport, because they can light their pipes and smoke in expectant ease; but the consolation of tobacco was debarred from boys who were, as Jim put it, “too young to smoke and too old to make idiots of themselves by trying it,” and so they found it undeniably dull.
Billy came down to join the party presently, after he had seen to his horses and unpacked old Polly’s load. His appearance gave Jim a brilliant idea, and he promptly despatched the black boy for cake, which proved a welcome stimulant to flagging enthusiasm.
“Don’t know if fish care about cake crumbs,” said Harry, finishing a huge slice with some regret.
“Didn’t get a chance of sampling any of mine,” Wally laughed; “I wanted it all myself. Hallo!”
“What is it—a bite?”
“Rather—such a whopper! I’ve got it, too,” Wally gasped, tugging at his line.