to keep his rod's point up and pull in the slack, all of which he managed to do easily. You are to remember always that MacArthur was a most accomplished fisherman. Suddenly he found a fish—which I had failed to observe. It lay near the bank on which we stood, evidently just posted for breakfast, about fifteen yards above us. The water was clear of rushes and weeds, nor was there any eddy or glide. The bank was free from high grass and trees, and all other nuisances. The wind blew gently up stream. I had a perfectly clear right-hand horizontal cast. It was what is called a "sitter." As we looked, the fish sucked down a fly.
"Have at him," said MacArthur, as he crouched to the earth. (What he had not read about dry-fly fishing was not worth writing.) "I want to see just how you do it."
It was inconceivable that I should ever find a more easily-placed trout. I knelt down, as the books recommend, let out line, cast, and the wind—the kindly wind of the west—dropped a pale olive three inches above the nose of the fish, which took it instantly. I hooked him, rattled him down stream, and had him in the net before the howl which MacArthur uttered as I struck had ceased to reverberate among the surrounding chalk-hills. I do not hesitate to say that the
