are other scenes and other times of equal pleasure that crowd my memory
as I write these lines. And so it will ever be to you, my friend, should
you, even in your later years, take up the angler’s art: it grows with
its growth, and strengthens with its strength, and, if uncurbed, may
perchance, with many of us, become a passion.
“But, for all that, it will fill the storehouse of our memories with
many a scene of unalloyed pleasure, which in the sunset of life we may
look back upon with fondest satisfaction.
“If in the minds of any one of you who as yet are ignorant of the charm
of fishing, as it has here been revealed. I have induced the desire
for a test, ‘Stand not upon the order of your going, but go at once,’
provided it be the season, and, the word of an old fisherman for it, you
will thank me for these random pages.”—_Charles W. Stevens._