RIZONTAL ELLIPSIS~} hard luck! I wanted you to get those fellows!" And to this day I am sure
he remembers those trout with a tinge of regret.

I had intended leaving him to fish the rest of the brook, while I went
back to that upper path to look up two or three special arbutus clumps
that I knew, but seeing his depression over the snag incident, I could not
suggest this. Instead I followed the stream with him, accepting his urgent
offer of all the best pools, while he, taking what was left, drew out
perfectly good trout from the most unhopeful-looking bits of water. And at
the end, there was time to return along the upper path and visit my old
friends, so both of us were satisfied.

On such days, however, there is always one person who is not satisfied,
and that is, Kit the horse. Kit has borne with our vagaries for many
years, but she has never come to understand them. She never fails to greet
our return, as our voices come within the range of her pricked-up ears, by
a prolonged and reproachful whinny, which says as plainly as is necessary,
"Back? Well--I should _think_ it was time! _I should think it was TIME!_"
Now and then we have thought it would be pleasant to have a little
motor-car that could be tucked away at any roadside, without reference to
a good hitching-place, but if we had it, I am sure we should miss that
ungracious welcoming whinny. We should miss, too, the exasperated violence
of Kit's pace on the first bit of the home road--a violence expressing in
the most ostentatious manner her opinion of folks who keep a respectable
horse hitched by the roadside, far from the delights of the dim, sweet
stable and the dusty, sneezy, munchy hay.

But leaving out this little matter of Kit's preference, and also the other
little matter of the trout's preference, I feel sure that an
arbutus-trouting is peculiarly satisfying. It meets every human need--the
need of food and beauty, the need of feeling strong and skillful, the need
of becoming deeply aware of nature as living and kind. Moreover, it is
very satisfying afterwards. As we sat that evening, over a late supper,
with a shallow dish of arbutus beside us, I remarked, "The advantage of
getting arbutus is, that you bring the whole day home with you and have it
at your elbow."

"The advantage of getting trout," remarked Jonathan dreamily, as if to
himself, "is, that you bring your whole day home with you, and have it for
breakfast."