CHAPTER I

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LINES IN PLEASANT PLACES

Being the Aftermath of an Old Angler

by

WILLIAM SENIOR

("Red Spinner")

[Frontispiece: "Red Spinner"]

Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co. Ltd.,

4 Stationers' Hall Court

London, E.C. 4

Copyright

First published 1920

INTRODUCTION

The half a dozen or so of Angling books which stand to my name were

headed by _Waterside Sketches_, and this is really and truly a

continuation, if not the end, of the series. They were inspired by my

old friend Richard Gowing, at the Whitefriars Club, of which he was for

many years the well-remembered honorary secretary, and of which I still

have the grateful pride of being entitled to the name of father.

Gowing had become editor of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ in 1874, and in

his sturdy efforts to give it new life he looked round amongst the

youngsters who seemed likely to serve him. The result was that he

invited me to try my hand at something. He had read my _Notable

Shipwrecks_, which the house of Cassells was at that time bringing out,

and said that its author, known to the public as "Uncle Hardy" only,

ought to be able to offer a suggestion.

The Stoke Newington reservoirs had about that time given me some good

sport with pike, large perch, chub, and tench, and I had long been an

angling enthusiast. Out of the fullness of my heart I spoke. I told

him that fishing was my best subject; that if he would accept a series

of contributions the direct object of which was to make Angling

articles as interesting to non-anglers as to anglers themselves, I

would be his man.

Verily I would not wonder if, in showing how botany, agriculture,

out-of-door life generally might be woven into the warp and woof of the

fabric, I became eloquent; for, as I have said, out of the heart the

mouth spoke. So it was agreed, and for a while "Red Spinner's"

articles graced the pages of the magazine, and they were by and by

republished in _Waterside Sketches_. They afterwards gave me entrance

to _Bell's Life_ and to the _Field_, and a name at any rate amongst the

brethren of the Angle, as to which I must not gush, but which is very

dear to the musings of an old man's eventide. How much I owe to "Red

Spinner" I shall never know. The name has followed me, and my brothers

of the Highbury Anglers have adopted it, but last year, in honour of

their always loyal, but I feel sure no longer useful President. I was

much amused to find how it had also followed me to Queensland. During

one of the Parliamentary recesses I went up country, the guest of a

squatter who was afterwards in the Ministry, and he introduced me to a

fellow squatter member in my surname as an officer of Parliament.

Neither the name nor office meant anything to him. But when we were

smoking in the veranda, and my friend mentioned, as an aside, that I

was "Red Spinner," the visitor leaped to his feet, came at me with a

double grip, and shouted a Scotch salmon-fisher's welcome, turning to

my host and furiously demanding, "Why the dickens didn't you tell me so

at first?"

On another Bush visit an officer in the Mounted Police showed me

amongst his curiosities a copy of _Waterside Sketches_ half devoured by

dingoes, and found with the scraps scattered around the skeleton of a

poor wayfarer left at the foot of a gum-tree. To fly-fishers the name

had an intelligible story of course, and it puzzled those non-anglers

for whom I tried always to write. The scores of times I was asked

"What does 'Red Spinner' mean?" by ladies as well as gentlemen, told me

how well I had kept the promise to the good Richard Gowing when those

articles were arranged.

Journalism proper, now and henceforth for the rest of my life claimed

me. It became my profession in fact; but it was always fishing that

kept the longing eye turned towards the waterside. Somehow for a time

the water was all round me, but I had not the means of learning the art

at that time, nor of practising it. Somehow I was always being

reminded that the fishing rod was to obtain the mastery by and by, but

I had to wait a long while for the opportunity. At first I was in what

may be called a good fishing country, but I seemed to have no say in

it. I had no rod; no fisheries were open. Indeed, it was journalism

that gripped me, and in those early days I followed the mastership of

it very closely, for there was so much to learn, as I shall be able, I

hope, to explain when any reminiscences that I am able to write call

for it. That longing must meanwhile be kept open for some years to

come.

Now, however, came the time when, as I have always considered, my real

life began. It was my fate to be appointed representative of the

_Lymington Chronicle_ in 1858, when I was duly installed in its office

in that town, engaged to look after the local news, the advertisements,

the circulation; and especially it was my business to see that not a

single paragraph was ever missing from the budget which I duly sent to

the head office in Poole at the end of every week. But still there was

no fishing, save in the river, where bass came occasionally to my hook

in the tidal portions; and one of six pounds I remember as the best

that came to me on the hand line. There was some talk once of a visit

that I was to pay to a trout river at Brockenhurst; but practically

nothing came of it, nor did a casual chance which Lord Palmerston gave

me at Broadlands, which was too far from my beat and altogether above

me in its salmon runs. As for perch, which I had fished for as a boy,

there were none to be heard of in the district.

In due time I was transferred from Lymington to Southampton, where I

remember catching smelts, and nice little baskets of them, from the

pier at the bottom of High Street. Next I went to Manchester, where

there was less of such fishing as I required than before; and on a

daily paper like the _Guardian_, journalism soon proved to be real

business to engage my attention, and left me without the slight

opportunities I found even with the _Lymington Chronicle_ or _Hants

Independent_. In due time fortune, as I thought, beamed upon me when I

got an appointment on the London _Daily News_, which was then in its

prime. Here I began to find what fishing meant, for very early, thanks

to the kindness of Moy Thomas and his friend Miles, the publisher, who

was one of the directors, I got a ticket for the famous New River

reservoirs. I was here introduced to many members of the fishing

club--men of the place--and became a member of the Stanley Anglers,

where I won some prizes, and of the somewhat famous and somewhat

high-class True Waltonian Society, which met at Stoke Newington. The

general result of this was that wherever there was fishing to be

secured I got it, and was seldom without opportunity of turning that

longing eye of which I aforetime spoke to the waterside. I made pretty

rapid progress too, for I became a well-known pike fisher at Stoke

Newington, got large chub and much perch, and generally took various

degrees in the piscatorial art.

Best of all, by means of my membership of the True Waltonians, I had

the run of the Rickmansworth water. It was here that I learnt

fly-fishing, even to the extent of catching my first trout, and here

that I went through a course of practice at some large dace which then

existed in the Colne; and they very freely, to the extent of half a

pound or so weight, took the dry fly, which in later years they did

not. As a very active travelling member of the special correspondence

staff of the _Daily News_ I went here and there on various errands, and

was soon known never to travel without my rod and creel. Then the

introduction to my old friend Gowing of the _Gentleman's Magazine_, as

I have already described, made me as eager to write as I was to fish;

and, in a word, this was how "Red Spinner" was manufactured.

Now I have explained how I became a practical angling writer, and the

half-dozen or so of books which I inflicted upon my brethren of the

Angle gradually came into existence. It is necessary to mention this

to account for the fact that the majority of what I write has appeared

before the public from year to year. Indeed, I did not allow the grass

to grow under my feet. My voyage to Queensland gave me a book, and a

series of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ chapters gave me another; and so

it went on from time to time, as I had the opportunity, in magazines

and papers, finding what I may call even a ready market for all I chose

to publish. The reader will understand, therefore, that after these

half-dozen books, if any of them are to be found registered against me,

there was not a great deal left for gathering together; and that is the

excuse for this volume which I have ventured to call the _Aftermath of

Red Spinner_. Indeed, just before the war broke out I had agreed to

supply a book to my old friend Mr. Shaylor, to be published by Simpkin,

Marshall & Co. It was to contain just what had been left over by

_Bell's Life_, the _Field_, and various magazines, and this I have

described as the "Aftermath." I therefore publish it, and I do so, if

I may be permitted, just as an old man's indulgence. Will the reader

be so good as to let it stand at that, and will my old friends accept a

humble plea for that indulgence? I make it very sincerely, and with a

grateful heart for long years of brotherhood and kindly comradeship.

There are obligations which must, however, be clearly and promptly

acknowledged with thanks most cordial: to the proprietors of the

_Field_, (now the Field Press, Limited), to _Baily's Magazine_, the

_Windsor Magazine_, and many others who kindly gave permission to

select what was required for my purpose. I hereby thank them one and

all, with apologies to others not mentioned through inadvertence.

AN OPEN LETTER TO WILLIAM SENIOR

MY DEAR RED SPINNER,

Only the other day I found in a bookseller's catalogue your _Waterside

Sketches_ with the word "scarce" against it. I already possess three

copies, one the gift of the author, but I very nearly wrote off for a

fourth because one cannot have too much of so good a thing. What

restrained me really was honest altruism. "Hold," I said to myself,

"there must be some worthy man who has no copy at all. Let him have a

chance." For it is a melancholy fact that Red Spinner's books have

been out of print an unconscionable while, only to be obtained in the

second-hand market, and even there with difficulty.

I am not surprised at this (failing new editions at rather frequent

intervals), but as a friend of man, and especially of man the angler, I

am sorry. I believe I have read almost everything that has been

written on the subject of fishing which comes within ordinary scope,

and a certain amount which is outside that scope, and I have amassed

fishing books to the number of several hundred. There is, however,

comparatively little of all this considerable literature that I keep on

a special shelf for reading and re-reading, a couple of dozen volumes

maybe--and a quarter of those Red Spinner's. Realising what a pleasure

and refreshment these books are to me and how often one or other of

them companions the evening tobacco, I can the better appreciate the

loss occasioned to other anglers by their gradual removal from the

lists of the obtainable.

But not very long ago I heard the good news that you had another volume

on the stocks, and I felt that the situation was improving. And now I

have had the privilege of actually reading that volume in the proof

sheets and can report the glad tidings for the benefit of my brethren

of the angle. At last they will be able to procure one of your books

by the simple process of entering a bookseller's and asking for it. I

do not propose here to say much about the new volume except that it

will certainly stand beside _Waterside Sketches_ on that special shelf

and that it will take its turn with the others in the regular sequence

of re-reading. It is the real article, what I may call "genuine Red

Spinner," hallmark and all. I must express my satisfaction that you

have given in it some further record of the angling in other lands

which you have enjoyed in your much-travelled experience. The

Antipodes, Canada, the United States, Norway, Belgium before the

tragedy--you make it all just as vivid to us as those cold spring days

on the rolling Tay, the glowing time of lilac and Mayfly, or the serene

evenings when the roach float dips sweetly at every swim. Whatever

one's mood, salmon or gudgeon, spinning bait or black gnat, Middlesex

or Mississippi, your pages have something to suit it.

Ever since I first met you, on a September evening at Newbury now

nearly twenty years ago, you have consistently given me ever-increasing

cause for gratitude. Whether as accomplished journalist and Editor of

the _Field_, as writer and author of books, as a man with a genius for

friendship, if I may quote the phrase, or as an expert with rod and

line--in whatever guise you appeared I had cause to thank you for

allowing me "to call you Master." That I am able to do so now thus

publicly means that one at least of my ambitions has been realised.

And I will take leave to subscribe myself with all affection, "Your

scholar,"

H. T. SHERINGHAM.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

AN OPEN LETTER

CHAPTER

I. ANGLING AS A REAL FIELD SPORT

II. MANFORD AND SERTON'S COSY NEST

III. MAYFLY DAYS AND DIALOGUES

IV. MY FIRST TWEED SALMON

V. MUSINGS OF A BUSH RIDE

VI. WITH VERDANT ALDERS CROWN'D

VII. A FIRST SPRINGER AND SOME OTHERS

VIII. ANGLING COUSINS AT THE VICARAGE

IX. A CONTRAST IN THAMES ANGLING

X. TWO RED LETTER SALMON

XI. A SERMON ON VEXATIONS AND CONSOLATIONS

XII. THE SALMON AND THE KODAK

XIII. HALFORD AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES

XIV. CASUAL VISITS TO NORWAY

XV. CASTING FROM ROCKS AND BOATS

XVI. SOME CONTRARIES OF WEATHER AND SPORT

XVII. LAST DAYS WITH NORWAY AND ITS SEA TROUT

XVIII. GLIMPSES OF CANADA, ETC.

XIX. HASTY VISITS TO AMERICA

XX. A DEVASTATED ARCADIA

LINES IN PLEASANT PLACES

CHAPTER I

ANGLING AS A REAL FIELD SPORT

One of the commonest misconceptions about angling is that it is just

the pastime for an idle man. "The lazy young vagabond cares for

nothing but fishing!" exclaims the despairing mother to her sympathetic

neighbour of the next cottage listening to the family troubles. Even

those who ought to know better lightly esteem the sport, as if,

forsooth, there were something in the nature of effeminacy in its

pursuit.

Not many summers ago a couple of trout-fishers were enjoined by the

open-handed country gentleman who had invited them to try his stream to

be sure and come in to lunch. They sought to be excused on the plea

that they could not afford to leave the water upon any such trifling

pretence, but they compounded by promising to work down the water-meads

in time for afternoon tea under the dark cedar on the bright emerald

lawn. As they sauntered up through the shrubberies, hot and weary, the

ladies mocked their empty baskets, and that was all fair and square;

but a town-bred member of the house-party shot at a venture a shaft

which they considered cruel:

"You ought to have joined us at luncheon, Captain Vandeleur," said she.

"I can't imagine what amusement you can find in sitting all day

watching a float."

To men whose shoulders and arms were aching after five hours'

greenheart drill at long distances, and who prided themselves upon

being above every form of fishing lower than spinning, the truly

knock-down nature of this blow can only be imagined by those who

understand the subject. The captain, who is reckoned one of the worst

men in the regiment to venture with in the way of repartee, was so

amazed at the damsel's ignorance that he answered never a word, leaving

some of her friends in muslin on the garden chairs around to explain

the difference between fishing with and without a float--a duty which

they appeared to perform with true womanly relish as a set-off against

the previous scoring of the pert maid from Mayfair, who had borne

rather heavily upon them from a London season elevation.

Allow me to recommend angling as a manly exercise, as physically hard

in some of its aspects as any other field sport. During the lifetime

of those of us who will no more see middle age this recreation has

become actually popular, and it is generally supposed that the

multiplication a hundredfold of rod-and-line fishermen in a generation

is explained by the cheaper and easier modes of locomotion, the

increase of cheap literature pertaining to the sport, and the

establishment of a periodical press devoted to it amongst other forms

of national recreation. These reasons are undoubtedly admissible. Yet

I venture to add another, namely, the great and beneficial movement

which has opened the eyes of men and women to the importance of

physical exercise.

When the young men who had in their boyhood been taught to regard

almost every form of recreation as a sin to be guarded against and

repented of, were taught another doctrine, a new impulse was given to

cricket, football, and all manner of athletics, and angling was quickly

discovered by many to offer exercise in variety, and to carry with it

charms of its own. To-day it is therefore so popular that anglers have

to protect themselves against one another if they would prevent the

depletion of lakes and rivers, and salmon and trout streams are quoted

as highly remunerative investments.

Let us see, however, where exercise worthy of the name is found--the

inquiry will at the same time indicate the nature of the fascinations

which to not a few good people are wholly incomprehensible, if, indeed,

they are not a mild form of lunacy. We may take for granted the

antiquity of the sport, though probably the first anglers had an eye to

nothing nobler than the pot. Angling has never been worth following as

an industry, for one of the first lessons learned by the rod fisherman

is that there are superior devices for filling a basket if that alone

is the object. "Because I like it," is the least troublesome reply to

one who asks you why you will go a-fishing. Happy he who can go a

little further and aver, "Because I find it the most entrancing of

sports." And with equally sound sense may it be urged by old and young

alike, "Because it is splendid exercise."

Angling in truth is often made much severer than it need be. The

American fishing-men, in their instinctive search for notions,

discovered long ago that the rods which they had copied from us were

too long and heavy, and the necessary tackle altogether too cumbersome.

They seldom use a longer salmon-rod than 15 feet, and frequently kill

the heavy trout of their lakes and rivers with delicate weapons of 8

and 9 feet.

In Scotland and Ireland, where the best of our salmon fishing is, you

may still meet with anglers who will have no rod under 18 or 20 feet.

Only big strong men accustomed to it can wield an implement of this

calibre through a hard day's casting without extreme fatigue. They

have a sound justification for their choice on such streams as Tweed,

Dee, and Spey, where the pools are of the major size and the getting

out of a long line is a necessity. They are not on such sure ground

when they urge that a heavy salmon can only be landed by a rod of

maximum dimensions. I saw a friend last autumn produce a 15-foot

greenheart rod on Tweedside. The gillies shook their heads

incredulously at the innovation, but honestly unlearned what they had

always believed to be infallible dogma when he killed his twenty-three

pound fish as quickly and safely as if the cause had been the 18-foot

rod which they had implored him to substitute for his most unorthodox

concern. It is true that there are "catches" which can only be covered

by long rods, with their undoubted advantages in sending out the fly,

picking the line off the water, and settling a fish with the promptest

dispatch.

The young salmon-fisher should learn to handle a rod that is sufficient

for his height and strength and no more. For ordinary purposes 17 feet

of greenheart or split-cane are ample, and the modern salmon angler has

come to look upon even this--which our forefathers would have

pooh-poohed as a mere grilse-rod--as excessive. The secret of

comfortable and successful angling, as an exercise no less than as a

sport, is in the choice of a rod. Some men seem to be unable to make

the right selection; they seem to lack the correct sense of touch and

balance. Others suffer from love of change; disloyal to the old friend

which fitted their hand to a nicety, they discard it for the passing

attractions of some newly-advertised pattern.

It is distressing to watch the efforts of the right man with the wrong

rod, or vice versa. With man and rod in harmony the latter does the

real work; unfitted to each other, the power of man and rod is alike at

its worst. Unfortunately this matter is one upon which the angler must

be his own teacher; but the angler's troubles, in the majority of

instances, arise from the fatal predilection for a rod heavier than the

owner can legitimately bear, or from the use of a line too fine or too

coarse for the rod. Exercise is then over-exercise, injurious, and not

good for body or temper.

Salmon fishing from a boat is imagined by some to be objectionable

because it demands no exertion by the angler. This is an erroneous

conclusion, though doubtless the method brings certain muscles into

play to an unequal degree. At the same time, fishing from the bank, as

it is called for convenience, though the angler never stands upon one,

is the most enjoyable of all methods. There is a rapture in the stream

as in the pathless woods.

In the foregoing remarks upon heavy rods I had possibly in my mind the

angler whose life is not entirely devoted to the open air. The

increase to which reference has been made has been chiefly from the

class of professional men, merchants, and others who have duties which

allow of only occasional relaxation devoted to the river. To such the

donning of wading gear for the first time in the season, the entrance

into the clear running water, the cautious advance upon the amber

gravel or solid rock, the swirl of the rushing stream around the knees,

the sensation of cold through the waterproofing, the arrival at length

at the point where the head of the pool is within range--these are a

keen delight. The pulses fly again when the hooked salmon is felt, and

the tightening line curves the rod from point to hand. Exercise,

indeed! Half an hour's battle with a fighting salmon, including a race

in brogues of a hundred yards or more over shingle or boulders will,

when the fish is gaffed and laid on the strand, find the best of men

well breathed and not sorry to sit him down till his excitement has

cooled and his nerves are once more steady.

Next in order, as a form of healthy exercise, comes pike fishing, as

practised by the spinner with small dead fish, the artificial

imitations of them, or the endless variations of the spoon, invented,

it is claimed, by an angler in the United States. Live baiting in a

river with float requires sufficient energy to walk at the same speed

as the current flows; by still water or in a boat the angler comes, of

course, fairly into the comprehension of the lady who was introduced on

another page. He watches and waits, and the more closely he imitates

the heron in his motionless patience the better for his chances. The

troller of olden times was at any rate always moving, and finer

exercise for a winter day than trolling four or five miles of river

could not be prescribed. But the gorge hook has gone out of fashion

and is discountenanced.

Spinning is for pike what the artificial fly is for salmon, the most

scientific method, and followed perseveringly it is downright hard

work, bringing, as the use of the salmon rod does, all the muscles of

the body into play. The degree of exercise depends upon the style

adopted. Casting direct from the Nottingham winch is less trying than

the ordinary and more familiar custom of working the incoming line

dropped upon the grass or floor of the boat, or gathered in the left

hand in coils after the manner of Thames fishermen. Few anglers are

masters of the Nottingham style, which has many distinct

recommendations, such as freedom from the entanglements of undergrowth

and rough ground.

The recovery of the spinning bait by regular revolutions of the winch

is not always a gain, since, with all his shark-like voracity, the pike

has his little caprices, and sometimes suspects the lure which is

moving evenly on a straight course through the water. The bait spun

home by the left hand manipulating the line while the right gives the

proper motion to the rod top is considered best for pike if not for

salmon. One of the good points about spinning for pike is that it is a

recreative exercise to be followed after the fly-rod is laid by after

autumn. November, December, and January are indeed the months to be

preferred before all the rest, and when pike fall out of season the

salmon and trout rivers are open again.

Trout fishing is the sport of the many amongst fly-fishermen, and the

exercise required in the methods which are recognised as quite orthodox

is probably the happy medium, yielding pleasure with the least penalty

of toil. The members of the most recent school of trout fishers are

believers in the floating fly, but it is wrong to assume that there is

any burning question in the matter. The best angler is the man who is

master of all the legitimate devices for beguiling fish into his

landing net, and I am not now concerned with any controversial aspects

of the dry-fly question. The spectacle of an angler upon a chalk

stream, where this style is to all intents and purposes Hobson's

choice, is not at all suggestive of bodily activity should he happen to

be "waiting for a rise." The trout will only heed an artificial fly

that is dropped in front of them with upstanding wings, and in form of

body and appendages, as in the manner of its progress on the surface of

the stream, this counterfeit presentment must strictly imitate the

small ephemeridae which are hatching in the bed and floating down the

surface of the stream. As the trout do not rise until the natural fly

appears, and as the hatches of fly are capricious, there are often

weary hours of waiting when the angler must be perforce inactive. His

exercise comes in full measure when the hour of action does arrive, and

he will find some motion even in the eventless intervals by walking up

the river on the look-out for olive dun or black gnat.

The whipper of the mountain streams, or the wet-fly practitioner who

fishes a river where the trout are not particular in their tastes, is

in the way of exercise the most fortunate of all. He is ever passing

from pool to pool, lightly equipped, changing his scenery every hour,

now whipping in the shadow of overhanging branches, now crouching

behind a mossy crag, and now brushing the sedges of an open section of

the stream. The broad tranquil flow is exchanged for merry ripples and

sparkling shallows, and these are succeeded by strong and concentrated

streams foaming and eddying down a rocky gorge. Trout here and there

are dropped into the pannier from time to time, and it is a wholesomely

tired angler, with a grand appetite and capacities for sound sleep, who

at night will welcome his slippers at the inn.

Sea-trout angling is to me the choicest sport offered by rod and line.

One degree more exacting to arms and legs than the more universal

employment of the pretty 10-foot trout rod with the purely fresh-water

species of the salmonidae, it still falls short of the heavier demands

of the salmon or pike rod. The double-handed rod, the moderately

strong line and collar, and the flies that are a compromise between the

March brown or alder and the Jock Scott or Wilkinson, offer you salmon

fishing in miniature. The sea trout are regular visitors to the rivers

which are honoured by their periodical visits, but they never linger as

long as salmon in the pools, and must be taken on their passage without

shilly-shallying.

A good sea trout on a 14-foot rod, and in a bold run of water fretted

by opposition from hidden rocks and obstinate outstanding boulders, is

game for a king. The exquisitely shaped silver model is a dashing and

gallant foe, worthy of the finest steel tempered at Kendal or Redditch.

No other fish leaps so desperately out of the water in its efforts to

escape, or puts so many artful dodges into execution, forcing the

angler with his arched rod and sensitive winch to meet wile with wile,

and determination with a firmness of which gentleness is the warp and

woof. While it lasts, and when the fish are in a sporting humour,

there is nothing more exciting than sea-trout angling. Perhaps for

briskness of sport one ought to bracket with it the Mayfly carnival of

the non-tidal trout streams in the generally hot days of early June,

when the English meadows are in all their glory, and the fish for a few

days cast shyness to the green and grey drakes and run a fatal riot in

their annual gormandising.

The greatest happiness for the greatest number in angling, I suppose,

must be credited to the patient disciples of Izaak Walton who take

their sport at their ease by the margins, or afloat on the bosom, of

the slow-running rivers which come under the regulations of what is

known as the Mundella Act. They are mostly the home of the coarse fish

of the British waters--pike, perch, roach, dace, chub, barbel, and the

rest. Some of them also hold trout and one or two salmon in their

season. They yield little of the kind of sport that gives the exercise

which I have made my theme as an excuse for, and recommendation of,

angling. But the humbler practices of angling with modest tackle and

homely baits take thousands of working people into the country, and if

sitting on a box or basket, or in the Windsor chair of a punt on Thames

or Lea does not involve physical exertion of a positive kind, it means

fresh air, rural sights and sounds, and the tranquil rest which after

all is the best holiday for the day-by-day toiler.