Carefully seizing him, I easily removed the hook from
the bony roof of his capacious mouth thickly set with sparkling teeth,
and then I tenderly killed him, with all his pluck, as old Peter would
have said, still in him.
I covered the rest of the fish in my basket with wet plantain leaves,
and laid my trout king on this cool green bed. Then I hurried off to the
old man, whom I saw coming out of the woods. When I opened my basket and
showed him what I had caught, Peter looked surprised, and, taking up
the trout, examined it.
"Why, this is a big fellow," he said. "At first I thought it was Barney
Sloat's boss trout, but it isn't long enough for him. Barney showed me
his trout, that gen'rally keeps in a deep pool, where a tree has fallen
over the stream down there. Barney tells me he often sees him, and he's
been tryin' fur two years to ketch him, but he never has, and I say he
never will, fur them big trout's got too much sense to fool round any
kind of victuals that's got a string to it. They let a little fish eat
all he wants, and then they eat him. How did you ketch this one?"
I gave an account of the manner of the capture, to which Peter listened
with interest and approval.
"If you'd a stood off and made a cast at that feller, you'd either have
caught him at the first flip, which isn't likely, as he didn't seem to
want no feather flies, or else you'd a skeered him away.
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