now circumventing a hillock that could not well be sapped, and now, as befits the length of its course, flowing silently, with full streams, through a croft knee-deep in daisies and meadowsweet; lovingly cutting its sinuous S's through the sward, as Izaak Walton carved his initials on Casaubon's tablet in Westminster Abbey; and yet again, like the Laureate's brook,
"Chattering over stony ways,
With many a silvery waterbreak
Above the golden gravel,"—
happy combination of elements from the diverse nationalities that make up the English nation. It distinguishes the names of the parishes through which it passes in some places by the Norman addition to them of "le beck," while they themselves frequently terminate, after the Scandinavian fashion, in "by" (i.e., dwelling). However, as there are in Lincolnshire alone two hundred and twelve places which have this termination, the exact locality of this particular beck can only be dimly guessed; and, sooth to say, if the angler has a failing, it consists in a natural dislike to reveal the exact situation of his favourite "stickles" to another.
Few objects in nature are so beautiful as running water; it soothes the mind as well as the eye, and disposes to reflection, sobering the jar of contending passions in the soul as it gleams along, always different in its chequered eddies, and yet always the same. The vegetation that springs on the brink of a stream very much heightens its charms to the true angler, who is always more or less of an artist and poet. Round this beck there are, indeed, no ferns tufting each projecting shelf, and seizing upon every bare stone and decayed tree. East Anglian scenery is wofully deficient in this element of the picturesque; but wild flowers gem its banks,
"Thick set with agate and the azure sheen
Of turkis blue and emerald green
That in the channel strays."
At every turn the marsh marigold blazes in brilliant golden clumps, while the water violet and bladderwort, most curious of our water-weeds, find place round many of the deeper pools. Overhead, too, hoary willows lend a great charm to the scenery, and patriarchal thorn bushes, that glitter with snow-flowers every May, and wonder at returning winter as they view their whiteness reflected below, while abundance of forget-me-nots, "for happy lovers," seek the most retired spots. Too often in the south of the county, as, for instance, round Croyland Abbey, lines of melancholy poplars disfigure the prospect, as they do (alas! did) round Metz, Avignon, and other French towns. It is curious, by the way, that so vivacious a people as the French should be fond of this, the most triste of trees. Here, however, willows are in exact keeping with the landscape; and as they turn the glaucous under-surface of their leaves to the light in the shivering breezes, instead of sadness, they speak of joy to the angler, for it is just when these capfuls of wind blow that the lazy trout in the holes under their shade rise eagerly at the fly. Once every year, in the city church of St James, in accordance with a benefactor's will, a sermon on flowers is preached from some floral text, to a congregation mainly composed of young people, each of them careful to carry a nosegay with them to the service. A walk down the beck, to one who knows anything of botany, or, better still, who really loves our wild flowers, is in itself a perpetual sermon. And how much are its exhortations strengthened if the angler be somewhat of an ornithologist! What a joyous melody proceeds from the ivy-covered fir, as Will Wimble[ [3] makes his way to the beck!