ked
delight in teasing the old males and running away just in time to escape
punishment. And when the nests began to be put to practical use, the
yearlings were very much in evidence. Strictly fresh eggs are as good
eating down under the water as they are on land, and, partly on this
account, and partly because direct sunshine is considered very injurious
to them, the mothers always covered them with gravel as quickly as
possible. But in spite of the best of care the current was constantly
catching some of them and sweeping them away, and our young friend would
creep up as near as he dared, and whenever one of the yellow-brown balls
came his way he would gobble it down with as little remorse as he had
felt for his first larva. Now and then an irate father would turn upon
him fiercely and chase him off, but in a few minutes he would be back
again, watching for eggs as eagerly as ever. Once, indeed, he had a
rather close call, for the biggest old male in all the stream came after
him with mouth open as if he would swallow him whole, as he could very
easily have done. Our friend was almost caught when the big fellow
happened to glance back and saw another trout coming to visit his wife,
and promptly abandoned the chase and went home to see about it.

A year later our Trout went again to the gravelly shallow, and this
time, being six inches long and about thirty months old, he decided to
make a nest of his own. He did so, and had just induced a most beautiful
young fish of the other sex to come and examine it, with a view to
matrimony, when that same big bully appeared on the scene, promptly
turned him out of house and home, and began courting the beautiful young
creature himself. It was very exasperating, not to say humiliating, but
it was the sort of thing that one must expect when one is only a
two-year-old.

The next year he had better luck. As another summer passed away, and the
cooler weather came on, he arrayed himself in his wedding finery, and it
almost seemed as if he had stolen some of the colors of the swamp
maples, in their gay fall dress, and was using them to deck himself out
and make a brave display. In later years he was larger and heavier, but
I don't think he was ever much handsomer than he was in that fourth
autumn of his life. His back was a dark, dusky, olive-green, with
mottlings that were still darker and duskier. His sides were lighter--in
some places almost golden yellow; and scattered irregularly