Salmonia; Or, Days of Fly Fishing: In a series of conversations. With some account of the habits of fishes belonging to the genus SalmoDavy, Humphry, Sir
Philosophy
Salmonia; Or, Days of Fly Fishing: In a series of conversations. With some account of the habits of fishes belonging to the genus Salmo
Davy, Humphry, Sir
Fishing
PHYS.—Like Ornither, I consider the destiny of this insect as desirable,
and I cannot help regarding the end of human life as most happy, when
terminated under the impulse of some strong energetic feeling, similar
in its nature to an instinct. I should not wish to die like Attila in a
moment of gross sensual enjoyment: but the death of Epaminondas or
Nelson in the arms of victory, their whole attention absorbed in the
love of glory and of their country, I think really enviable.
POIET.—I consider the death of the martyr or the saint as far more
enviable; for in this case, what may be considered as a divine instinct
of our nature, is called into exertion, and pain is subdued, or
destroyed, by a secure faith in the power and mercy of the Divinity. In
such cases man rises above mortality, and shows his true intellectual
superiority. By intellectual superiority I mean that of his spiritual
nature, for I do not consider the results of reason as capable of being
compared with those of faith. Reason is often a dead weight in life,
destroying feeling, and substituting, for principle, calculation and
caution; and, in the hour of death, it often produces fear or
despondency, and is rather a bitter draught than nectar or ambrosia in
the last meal of life.
HAL.—I agree with Poietes. The higher and more intense the feeling,
under which death takes place, the happier it may be esteemed; and I
think even Physicus will be of our opinion, when I recollect the
conclusion of a conversation in Scotland. The immortal being never can
quit life with so much pleasure as with the feeling of immortality
secure, and the vision of celestial glory filling the mind, affected by
no other passion than the pure and intense love of God.
NINTH DAY.
HALIEUS—POIETES—ORNITHER—PHYSICUS.
FISHING FOR HUCHO.
_Scene—The Fall of the Traun, Upper Austria.
Time—July_.
POIET.—THIS is a glorious scene! And the fall of this great and clear
river, with its accompaniments of wood, rock, and snow-clad mountain,
would alone furnish matter for discussion and conversation for many
days. This place is quite the paradise of a poetical angler; the only
danger is that of satiety with regard to sport; for these great grayling
and trout are so little used to the artificial fly, that they take
almost any thing moving on the top of the water. You see I have put on a
salmon fly, and still they rise at it, though they never can have seen
any thing like it before—and it is, in fact, not like any thing in
nature.
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