Perhaps the Deacon had an experience as exciting, if not as satisfactory, as that ever allotted to any fisherman. He and his son and the Preacher were fishing on Big St. Germain. The hotel was provided with a porch which ran along the entire front. As the party came in from an afternoon with the pike, the rods were placed against this porch, butts on the ground and tips projecting above the porch roof. The Preacher was the first to finish his supper, and as he came out the front door a peculiar combination of sounds was heard. Spitting, snarling, scratching were mingled with the clicking of a reel. It was the Deacon’s reel that seemed to be working alone and unaided, and the mystery was solved only when it was discovered that a cat had climbed upon the porch roof, swallowed the minnow that the Deacon had failed to remove from the hook, and was now making frantic efforts to escape. When the Deacon was informed of what was certainly nothing short of a cat-astrophe, he hastened to the rescue. Then and there was furnished such an exhibition of artistic and skilful handling of a rod as few have been permitted to witness. If a ten-pound trout instead of a cat had been at the end of the line, the Deacon could not have done better. Did the cat run up the side of the building, the Deacon paid out line. Did it run down again, he reeled in. His poise and calm were admirable. Once, indeed, when the youngster giggled, the Deacon’s voice was heard remarking that he did not see anything to laugh at. This furnished an atom too much for the Preacher’s self-control, and he hurried into a boat and rowed hastily out to the middle of the lake where he could give vent to the emotions which rent and tore him. An hour later, when the Preacher returned, all was peaceful. Despite the Deacon’s skill--possibly because of it--the cat had gotten off.