manner for mountain trout.
This, it seems, was Test Two,
end I’d muffed it.
Shortly after Picture One I ex
perienced my lirst big accident.
Phillips and Hogan had gone, se
parately, upstream. Ray, lead
ing me downstream had equip
ped my line with a Buddy Bop
fly—a species of silken insect or
iginated, he said by our friend
Phillips, and named by him for
his grandson. Ray, moreover
had shown me just how to play
out my line from the reel and
how to make casts. It was much
he explained, lixe cracking a
whip over a team of six and
touching, say, the off leader
neatly on the tip of the tallest
hair of the left ear. He praised
extravagantly my first attempts;
then, with the squirming eager
ness of a schoolboy hearing dis
missal bell, he plunged on ahead.
It was now perhaps eight
o’clock in the morning. The sun
was hot on the back of the neck
and the air was of the Montana
Rockies—dry, electric, seeming
’y slightly to lift the whole body
with every breath. I stood brac
ed in my boots toward the mid
dle of the river with hastening
tons of snow-cold water, crystal
clear, thrust against my legs.
And it was the waters of the riv
er, not my merely human legs,
that were giving up the fight,
breaking to the right and left,
tumbling away. It is such a phe
nomena that make a man proud
and happy, I thought; and then
I remembered my preacher
friend and what he said about
fast-water fishing being a con
test, and I laughed at myself
and at him and at all men, so
credulous, so small, yet so vain
glorious, always so eager to
prove that amid the immensi
ty of everything they, at least,
stand strong, proud, victorious.
I laughed, yet knew that
somehow at this hour and place
I had come to that peace with
life and contentment with self
which tlie Scriptures say, “pass
etli all understanding.”
Ray had now gone far ahead
of me and was out of sight. I
stood in a world by myself. There
was only silence and the quick
waters of the river, and the
mountains and the sky. Slate
gray water ouzels, a rare forest
fast-water bird, dipped and
swayed. These too were living
creatures, I reflected, but mere
vital accessory parts of a world
wholly mine.
At this point in my medita
tions I made a thoroughly cock
eyed cast and hooked the first
poor fish of the day—an eastern
sucker. By some curious manip
ulation my feathered hook had
not only missed the riffles twenty
feet ahead, but had traveled all
the way back around my head,
and now sat lodged, gayly color
er feathers and all, deeply in the
fleshy under part of my neck be
tween the windpipe and the chin.
It did not seem to hurt very
much until I gave it a tug, and
then it hurt like forty thousand
devils. I stood there in the mid
dle of the river considering what
to do. I felt remarkably foolish
standing there, like a man sud
denly bewitched with a fanciful
dab of brightly colored chin
whiskers, connected to his hand
by a steel rod and an intricate
tangle of string.
Starting to wade ashore I
stepped on a slippery rock and
went completely under. The riv
er carried me—chin-barb, tack
le and all—for maybe ten feet
before I found footing and wad
ed out. I sat pondering for the
short while that it takes in
Montana to dry off. Then I hol
lered for Ray, and he, to make a
long story short, operated suc
cessfully on my neck with a
pocketknife disenfected with
river water and Rocky Mountain
sunshine. We sat for awhile
and talked, then wrent back to
our fishing.
Paying more attention now to
my casting I began to take
pleasure in the clean, successive
flow of leg, back and arm mus
cles which even inexpert casting
demands. I came to a place
where the river clattered noisi
ly over rocks. Foremost was one
especially great rock and behind
it streaked an unbroken triang
ular patch of smooth water. Ray
had said to look out for trout in
places like that.
I made a cast over the rock
and hit, by golly, right in the
middle of the spot!
There I got my first strike
which is fast-water fishing lan
guage for “bite.” And with jus
tice. For trout in fast water do
not simply bite; they coil with all
strength into a strike, a lunge, o
ravenous, murderous grab.
And when they thus strike the
thrill of it runs up the leader to
the pole, down the pole to the
arm and the tips of the toes, anc.
then up through every part o:
the body to the base of the
brain.
You’ve heard of buck fever
the trembling fright of th
hunter sighting his first deer.
The same thing happens whe::.
your first trout strikes. Heave::
knows how I ever got that firs!
one of mine ashore. He all bu .
doubled the rod with his dashes:
upstream, downstream, sideways..
Twice I thought I’d lost him,
and all the time I knew he wa ■
still there I had a crazy impulse
to yell for help.
Finally he gave in and I stum -
bled ashore with him and jump -
ed up and down and sang an 1
shouted for Ray to come an 1
look. 4
“By gosh ” he said, “you di 1
get one. Rainbow. See all th ?
colors there? Right fair one too.
About a two pounder.”
Thus my second big accider.'
of the day—I caught one. Ray
was aLoat as pleased with n: -
catch as I was. but not so exei
ed. We went back to fAs c
and met the ether two fella.:;