rod became a bent bow.

"By the bones of Sir Izaak!" cried the colonel, "I've hooked one, Shag!"

"De Lord be praised! So yo' has, Colonel!" cried the negro.

"Shut up!" ordered the colonel, who was beginning to play his fish.
"Did I tell you to speak?"

But Shag only laughed. He knew his master.

After ten minutes of skilful work, during which time the trout nearly
got away by shooting under a submerged log like an undersea boat diving
beneath a battle cruiser, the colonel landed his fish, dropping it,
panting, on the green grass. Then he looked up at Shag and remarked:

"Didn't I tell you this was a perfectly beautiful day?"

"Yo' suah did, Colonel," was the chuckling answer. "Yo' suah did!"

And so much at peace with himself and all the world was Colonel Robert
Lee Ashley just then that, when the crackling of the underbrush behind
him, a moment later, gave notice that some one was approaching, there
was even a smile on his face, though, usually, he could not bear to be
intruded upon when fishing.

Rather idly the colonel, having mercifully killed his fish by a blow on
top of the head and slipped it into the grass-lined creel, looked up to
see approaching a young lady and a tall and somewhat lanky boy. There
was some thing vaguely familiar about the boy, though the fisherman did