he stream. This branch Mr Sudberry, in his eagerness,
did not observe. In casting, he thrust the end of his rod violently
into it; the line twirled in dire confusion round the leaves and small
boughs, and the drag hook, as if to taunt him, hung down within a foot
of his nose.

Mr Sudberry, in despair, made a desperate grasp at this and caught it.
More than that--it caught him, and sunk into his forefinger over the
barb, so that he could not get it out. The rock on which he stood was
too narrow to admit of much movement, much less to permit of his resting
the butt of his rod on it, even if that had been practicable--which it
was not, owing to the line being fast to the bough, and the reel in a
state of dead-lock from some indescribable manoeuvre, to which it had
previously been subjected.

There he stood, the very personification of despair; but while standing
there he revolved in his mind the best method of releasing his line
without breaking it or further damaging his rod. Alas! fortune, in this
instance, did not favour the brave. While he was looking up in rueful
contemplation of the havoc above, and then down at his pierced and
captured finger, his foot slipped and he fell with a heavy plunge into
deep water. That settled the question. The whole of his tackle
remained attached to the fatal bough excepting the hook in his finger,
with which, and the remains of his fishing-rod, he floundered to the
shore.

Mr Sudberry's first act on gaining the land was to look into his
basket, where, to his great relief, the trout was still reposing. His
next was to pick up his hat, which was sailing in an eddy fifty yards
down the stream. Then he squeezed the water out of his garments, took
down his rod, with a heavy sigh strangely mingled with a triumphant
smile, and turned his steps home just as the sun began to dip behind the
peaks of the distant hills.

To his surprise and relief; Mrs Sudberry did _not_ scold when, about an
hour later, he entered the hall or porch of the White House with the
deprecatory air of a dog that knows he has been misbehaving, and with
the general aspect of a drowned rat. His wife had been terribly anxious
about his non-arrival, and the joy she felt on seeing him safe and well,
induced her to forget the scold.

"Oh! John dear, quick, get off your clothes," was her first
exclamation.

As for Jacky, he uttered a cheer of delight and amazement at beholding
his father in such a woeful pligh