ect of which was to make Angling
articles as interesting to non-anglers as to anglers themselves, I
would be his man.

Verily I would not wonder if, in showing how botany, agriculture,
out-of-door life generally might be woven into the warp and woof of the
fabric, I became eloquent; for, as I have said, out of the heart the
mouth spoke. So it was agreed, and for a while "Red Spinner's"
articles graced the pages of the magazine, and they were by and by
republished in _Waterside Sketches_. They afterwards gave me entrance
to _Bell's Life_ and to the _Field_, and a name at any rate amongst the
brethren of the Angle, as to which I must not gush, but which is very
dear to the musings of an old man's eventide. How much I owe to "Red
Spinner" I shall never know. The name has followed me, and my brothers
of the Highbury Anglers have adopted it, but last year, in honour of
their always loyal, but I feel sure no longer useful President. I was
much amused to find how it had also followed me to Queensland. During
one of the Parliamentary recesses I went up country, the guest of a
squatter who was afterwards in the Ministry, and he introduced me to a
fellow squatter member in my surname as an officer of Parliament.
Neither the name nor office meant anything to him. But when we were
smoking in the veranda, and my friend mentioned, as an aside, that I
was "Red Spinner," the visitor leaped to his feet, came at me with a
double grip, and shouted a Scotch salmon-fisher's welcome, turning to
my host and furiously demanding, "Why the dickens didn't you tell me so
at first?"

On another Bush visit an officer in the Mounted Police showed me
amongst his curiosities a copy of _Waterside Sketches_ half devoured by
dingoes, and found with the scraps scattered around the skeleton of a
poor wayfarer left at the foot of a gum-tree. To fly-fishers the name
had an intelligible story of course, and it puzzled those non-anglers
for whom I tried always to write. The scores of times I was asked
"What does 'Red Spinner' mean?" by ladies as well as gentlemen, told me
how well I had kept the promise to the good Richard Gowing when those
articles were arranged.

Journalism proper, now and henceforth for the rest of my life claimed
me. It became my profession in fact; but it was always fishing that
kept the longing eye turned towards the waterside. Somehow for a time
the water was all round me, but I had not the means of learning the art
at tha