y other such adventures he had--too
many to enumerate. However, I don't think they ever troubled him very
much except for the moment. He grew more wary, no doubt, but he didn't
do much worrying. Somehow or other he always escaped by the skin of his
teeth, and the next spring he was swallowing the new crop of young fry
with as little concern as his older relations had shown in trying to
swallow him. So far he seemed to be one of the few who are foreordained
to eat and not be eaten, though it was more than likely that in the end
he, too, would die a violent death.

When he was about a year and a half old he noticed that all the larger
trout in the stream were gathering in places where the water was
shallow, the bottom pebbly, and the current rapid; and that they acted
as if they thought they had very important business on hand. He wanted
to do as the others did, and so it happened that he went back again to
the gravelly shallow where the air-bubbles had first found him. By this
time he was about as large as your finger, or possibly a trifle larger,
and he had all the bumptiousness of youth and was somewhat given to
pushing himself in where he wasn't wanted.

The male trout were the first to arrive, and they promptly set to work
to prepare nests for their mates, who were expected a little later. It
was a simple process. All they did was to shove the gravel aside with
their noses and fins and tails, and then fan the sediment away until
they had made nice, clean little hollows in the bed of the stream; but
there was a good deal of excitement and jealousy over it, and every
little while they had to stop and have a scrap. The biggest and
strongest always wanted the best places, and if they happened to take a
fancy for a location occupied by a smaller and weaker fish, they drove
him out without ceremony and took possession by right of the conqueror.
For the most part their fighting seemed rather tame, for they did little
more than butt each other in the ribs with their noses, but once in a
while they really got their dander up and bit quite savagely. And when
the lady trout came to inspect the nests that had been prepared for
them, then times were livelier than ever, and the jealousy and rivalry
ran very high, indeed.

Of course our Trout was too young to bear a very prominent part in these
proceedings, but he and some companions of about his own age skirmished
around the edges of the nesting grounds, and seemed to take a wic