moor-hen. She is a small-minded fish, a riser-at-nothing, a mere breaker of surfaces, a ring-producer, a maker of deceptive sounds, a frog. A jelly-fish is a better fish. I had rather see a dog fetching sticks than a little grayling at play on a good gravel. She is as distressing to me as a Candidate's child that lisps the praises of his dada to a mass meeting. Politics is a man's job. Rising is the business of large earnest fishes. If the little grayling came up in search of food I might have more respect for her. But she doesn't. The less there is on the water the more eagerly does she rise, which is absurd.
The anguish of a blank day is considerable, but it is tenfold keener if at every odd moment one has been tricked into supposing that the fly was coming on. That is the little grayling's idea of giving one a pleasant time.
It is one which she shares with the daces alone. With the daces!
No other fishes do this. Salmon do not; pike do not. Who has ever seen crayfishes messing about after nothing at all, on top of all the best glides? Do carps do it? No. Perches? No. Roaches? I don't know. Perhaps. Add them, if you will, to the others. A precious trinity. Barbels? Do they do it? No. They live on barbel baits, which they suck from anglers' hooks
