By-and-by I strayed downward to the beach, a narrow strip of silvery sand and variegated pebbles, and stood there long, silently watching the unknown sports, the seemingly--to us at least--unmeaning movements, and strange groupings of the small fry, which darted to and fro in the clear shallows within two yards of my feet; or marking the brief circling ripples, wrought by the morning swallow's wing, and momently subsiding into the wonted rest of the calm lake. How long I stood there musing I know not, for I had fallen into a train of thought so deep that I was utterly unconscious of everything around me, when I was suddenly aroused from my reverie by the quick dash of oars, and by a volley of some seven barrels discharged in quick succession. As I looked up with an air, I presume somewhat bewildered, I heard the loud and bellowing laugh of Tom and saw the whole of our stout company gliding up in two boats, the skiff and the canoe, toward the landing place, perhaps a hundred yards from the spot where I stood. "Come here, darn you," were the first words I heard, from the mouth of what speaker it need not be said--"come here, you lazy, snortin, snoozin Decker--lend a hand here right stret away, will you? We've got more perch than all of us can carry--and Archer's got six wood-duck." Hurrying down in obedience to this unceremonious mandate, I perceived that indeed their time had not been misemployed, for the whole bottom of the larger boat was heaped with fish--the small and delicate green perch, the cat-fish, hideous in its natural, but most delicious in its artificial shape, and, above all, the large and broad-backed yellow bass, from two to four pounds weight. While Archer, who had gone forth with Garry only in the canoe, had picked up half a dozen wood-duck, two or three of the large yellow-legs, a little bittern, known by a far less elegant appellative throughout the country, and thirteen English snipe. "By Jove!" cried I, "but this is something like--where the deuce did you pick the snipe up, Harry--and, above all, why the deuce did you let me lie wallowing in bed this lovely morning?"