We have the whole day before us;
the fly will not be up till five o'clock at least; and then the real
fishing will begin. Why tire ourselves beforehand? The squire will
send us luncheon in the afternoon, and after that expect us to fish
as long as we can see, and come up to the hall to sleep, regardless
of the ceremony of dressing. For is not the green drake on? And
while he reigns, all hours, meals, decencies, and respectabilities
must yield to his caprice. See, here he sits, or rather tens of
thousands of him, one on each stalk of grass--green drake, yellow
drake, brown drake, white drake, each with his gauzy wings folded
over his back, waiting for some unknown change of temperature, or
something else, in the afternoon, to wake him from his sleep, and
send him fluttering over the stream; while overhead the black drake,
who has changed his skin and reproduced his species, dances in the
sunshine, empty, hard, and happy, like Festus Bailey's Great Black
Crow, who all his life sings 'Ho, ho, ho,'
'For no one will eat him,' he well doth know.
Pages:
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56