i was very small when i began to fish,—so small and young that i cannot remember when it was. in fact, my first fishing comes to me now, not as a distant recollection, but only as a vague impression of a far-off world where a little boy once lived and roamed. i am quite sure that i first dropped my line into the little muddy pool just behind our garden fence. i am sure, too, that this line was twisted by my mother’s hands from spools of thread, and the hook was nothing but a bended pin. i faintly recall my protests that a real fish-line and hook bought at the store would catch more fish than this homemade tackle that my kind mother twisted out of thread to save the trifling expense; but all my protests went for naught. i was told that the ones she made were just as good as the others, and that i must take them or go without. all that remains to me of those first 166fishing-days is the faint impression of a little child sitting on an old log back of the cheese-house, his bare feet just touching the top of the little pool, holding a fish-pole in his hands, and looking in breathless suspense at the point where the line was lost in the muddy stream.
more distinctly do i remember a later time, when i had grown old enough to go down the road to the little bridge, and to have a real fish-line and a sharp barbed hook which my brother brought me from the store. i go out on the end of the planks and throw my line close up to the stone abutments in the dark shadow where the water lies deep and still. the stream is the same fitful winding creek that comes down through the meadow behind the garden-fence; but here it seems to stop and linger for awhile under the protecting shadows of the little wooden bridge. i have no doubt that the spot is very deep,—quite over my head,—and with throbbing heart i sit and wait for some kind fish to take my baited hook. i learned later that i could wade clear under the bridge by pulling my trousers up above my knees; but this was after i had sat and fished. true, my older brothers had always told me that there was nothing but minnows in the muddy pool; but how did they know? their eyes could see no farther into the unknown stream than mine.
i do not remember catching a single fish either behind the cheese-house or under the bridge; but i do remember the little bare-legged boy, with torn straw hat, waiting patiently as he held his pole above the pool, and wondering at the perversity of the fish. if i could only have seen to the bottom of the stream, no doubt i should have known there were no fishes there for me to catch; but as i could not see, i was sure that if i sat quite still and kept my line well up to the abutment of the bridge, the fishes would surely come swimming up eager to get caught.
many a time i was certain that the fishes were just going to bite my hook; but at the most critical moment some stupid farmer would drive his noisy clattering wagon at full speed upon the sounding bridge, and as like as not shout to me, and of course drive all the fishes off. or, even worse, the driver would halt his team just before he reached the 168little bridge, get down from the high wagon seat, unrein his horses, and drive them down the sloping bank to the edge of the bridge to get a drink. the stupid horses would push their long noses clear up under the bridge, close to the stone abutment where i had cast my line, clear down almost to the bottom of the pool, and drink and drink until they were fairly bursting with water, and finally they would stamp their feet, and splash through to the other side, pulling along the great wagon-wheels after them. of course it was a waste of time to sit and fish after a catastrophe like this. but although i caught no fish, still day after day i would go back to the end of the planks and throw my baited hook into the pool, and sit and blink in the broiling sun and wait for the fish to bite.
but when i grew older i gave my fishing-tackle to my younger brothers and let them sit on the old log and the end of the bridge where i had watched so long, and, turning my back in scorn upon the little stream, sought deeper waters farther on.
i followed my older brother up to the dam, and sat down in the shade of the overhanging willow-trees, and cast my line over the bank into the deep water, which was surely filled with fish. perhaps in those days it was not the fish alone, but the idea of fishing. it was the great pond, which seemed so wide and deep, and which spread out like glass before my eyes. it was the big willow-trees that stood in a row just by the water’s edge, with their drooping branches hanging almost to the ground, and casting their cool delicious shade over the short grass where we sat and fished; and then the blue sky above,—the sky which we did not know or understand, or really think about, but somehow felt, with that sense of freedom that always comes with the open sky. surely, to sit and fish, or to lie under the green trees and look up through their branches at the white clouds chasing each other across the clear blue heavens,—this was real, and a part of the life of the universe, and also the life of the little child.
how many castles we built from the changing forms of those ever-hurrying clouds, moving on and ever on until they were lost in the great unknown blue! how many dreams we dreamed, how many visions we saw,—visions 170of our manhood, our great strength, and the wonderful achievements that would some day resound throughout the world! and those castles and dreams and visions of our youth,—where are they now? what has blasted the glowing promises that were born of our young blood, the free air, and the endless blue heavens above? well, what matters is whether or not the castles were ever really built? at least the dreams were a part of childhood’s life, as later dreams are a part of maturer years. and, after all, if the dreams had not been dreamed then life had not been lived.
but here in the great pond we sometimes caught real fish. true, we waited long and patiently, with our lines hanging listlessly in the stream. true, the fishes were never so large or so many as we hoped to catch, but such as they were we dragged them relentlessly from the pond and strung them on a willow stick with the greatest glee.
i remember distinctly the time when some accident befell the dam, and the water was drawn off to make repairs. the great surface of stone and mud for the first time was uncovered to our sight, and i remember the flopping 171and struggling fishes that found themselves with no water in which to swim. i remember how we pounced upon these fishes, and caught them with our hands, and almost filled a washtub with the poor helpless things. i cannot recall that i thought anything about the fishes, except that it was a fine chance to catch them and take them home; although the emptying of the mill-pond must have been the greatest and most serious catastrophe to them,—not less than comes to a community of men and women from the sinking of a city in the sea. but we had then only seen the world from the point of view of children and not of fishes.
but it was not until i was large enough to go off to the great river that wound down the valley that i really began to fish. i had then grown old enough to get first-class lines and hooks and a bamboo pole. i went with the other boys down below the town, down where our little stream joined its puny waters with the great river that scarcely seemed to care whether it joined or not, and down to the long covered bridge, where the dust lay cool and thick on the wooden floor. here i used to sit on the masonry just below the footpath, and throw my line into the deep water, and wait for the fish to come along.
where is the boy or the man who has not fished, and who does not in some way keep up his fishing to the very last? yet it is not easy to understand the real joys of fishing. its fascination must grow from the fact that the line is dropped into the deep waters where the eye cannot follow and only imagination can guess what may be pulled out; it is in the everlasting hope of the human mind about the things it cannot know. in some form i am sure i have been fishing all my life, and will have no other sort of sport. ever and ever have i been casting my line into the great unknown sea, and generally drawing it up with the hook as bare as when i threw it down; and still this in no way keeps me from dropping it in again and again, for surely sometime something will come along and bite! we are all fishers,—fishers of fish, and fishers of each other; and i know that for my part i have never managed to get others to nibble at my hook one-half so often as i have swallowed theirs.
173our youthful fishing did not all consist in dropping our hooks and lines into the stream. in fishing, as everywhere in life, the expectation was always one of the chief delights. how often did we begin our excursions on the night before! we planned to get up early, that we might be ready to furnish the fishes with their breakfast,—to come upon them after their night’s sleep, when they were hungry and would bite eagerly at our baited hooks. how expectantly we took the spade and went to the garden and dug up the choicest and fattest worms,—enough to catch all the fishes in the sea! then at night we dreamed of fish. we went to bed at twilight, that we might be ready in the gray morning hours. we started out early with lines and poles and bait. we stopped awhile at the big covered bridge and sat on the hard stone abutments, we put the wiggling worms upon the hooks and threw our lines far out into the stream. i cannot recollect that we thought of any pain to the fish, or still less to the worm,—though i do not believe that i could string a twisting worm over the length of one of those cold steel hooks to-day, no matter what reward might come. my father 174did not encourage me in fishing, although i do not remember that he said much about how cruel it really was. but he told me never to take a fish that i could not eat, and to throw the small ones back into the stream at once. yet though all the fishes that came up were smaller than i had hoped or believed, still i was always reluctant to throw them back.
the first fishing-spot seldom fulfilled our expectations, and most of us waited awhile and then went farther down the stream. slowly and carefully we followed the winding banks, and we always felt sure that each new effort would be more successful than the last. but our expectations were never quite fulfilled. now and then we would meet men and boys with a fine string of fish. these were generally of the class my father called shiftless and worthless; but as for us, we had little luck. gradually, as the sun got higher in the heavens, we went farther and farther down the stream, always hopeful for success in the next deep hole. finally, tired and hungry, we threw away our bait, and, with our small string of sickly-looking fish, turned toward home. sometimes on our return we came upon a more patient boy who had sat quietly all day at the hole we left and been abundantly rewarded for his pains. generally, weary and worn out, we would drop our fish on the woodshed floor and go into the kitchen to get our supper. not until the next day would we again think of our string of fish, and then we usually found that the cat had eaten them in the night.
when we reflected on our fishing, it was a little hard to tell where the fun came in; but on the whole this is true of most childish sports, and, for that matter, it holds good with all those of later years. but this has no tendency to make us stop the sport, or rather the hope of sport, for to give up hope is to give up life.
the last time i drove across the old covered bridge i stopped for a moment by the stone pier where i used to sit and fish. i looked over at the muddy stream, and the hard gray abutment where i had watched so patiently through many hot and dusty days; and there in the same place where i once sat and expectantly held my pole above the stream was another urchin not unlike the one i knew, or thought i knew, so long ago. i lingered a few moments, and shuddered as i saw the cruel boy push the barbed hook through the whole length of the squirming worm. i watched him throw the bait silently into the yellow stream, and, behold! in a short time he pulled out a little wiggling fish. i went up to him as he took the murderous hook from the writhing fish, and tried to make him think that it was so small that he ought to throw it back. but in spite of all i could say, the little brute stuck a willow twig through its bleeding gills and strung it on a stick, as i had done when i was a little savage catching fish.
