“Move eastward, happy earth, and leave
      Yon orange sunset fading slow;
   From fringes of the faded eve
      Oh, happy planet, eastward go,

I murmured, though the atmospheric conditions were not really those described by the poet.

   “Ah, bear me with thee, smoothly borne,
   Dip forward under starry light,
   And move me to my marriage morn,
   And round again to—­

“‘River in grand order, sir,’ said the voice of Robins, the keeper, who recognised me in the moonlight.  ’There’s a regular monster in the Ashweil,’ he added, naming a favourite cast; ’never saw nor heard of such a fish in the water before.’

“‘Mr. Dick must catch him, Robins,’ I answered; ’no fishing for me to-morrow.’

“‘No, sir,’ said Robins, affably.  ’Wish you joy, sir, and Miss Olive, too.  It’s a pity, though!  Master Dick, he throws a fine fly, but he gets flurried with a big fish, being young.  And this one is a topper.’

“With that he gave me good-night, and I went to bed, but not to sleep.  I was fevered with happiness; the past and future reeled before my wakeful vision.  I heard every clock strike; the sounds of morning were astir, and still I could not sleep.  The ceremony, for reasons connected with our long journey to my father’s place in Hampshire, was to be early—­half-past ten was the hour.  I looked at my watch; it was seven of the clock, and then I looked out of the window:  it was a fine, soft grey morning, with a south wind tossing the yellowing boughs.  I got up, dressed in a hasty way, and thought I would just take a look at the river.  It was, indeed, in glorious order, lapping over the top of the sharp stone which we regarded as a measure of the due size of water.

“The morning was young, sleep was out of the question; I could not settle my mind to read.  Why should I not take a farewell cast, alone, of course?  I always disliked the attendance of a gillie.  I took my salmon rod out of its case, rigged it up, and started for the stream, which flowed within a couple of hundred yards of my quarters.  There it raced under the ash tree, a pale delicate brown, perhaps a little thing too coloured.  I therefore put on a large Silver Doctor, and began steadily fishing down the ash-tree cast.  What if I should wipe Dick’s eye, I thought, when, just where the rough and smooth water meet, there boiled up a head and shoulders such as I had never seen on any fish.  My heart leaped and stood still, but there came no sensation from the rod, and I finished the cast, my knees actually trembling beneath me.  Then I gently lifted the line, and very elaborately tested every link of the powerful casting-line.  Then I gave him ten minutes by my watch; next, with unspeakable emotion, I stepped into the stream and repeated the cast.  Just at the same spot he came up again; the huge rod bent like a switch, and the salmon rushed straight down the pool, as if he meant