Brion, hiding behind a convenient bush, got ready his tackle. This consisted of a twelve-foot fir rod, painted of a pale green with verdigris and linseed oil; of a line contrived of horse-hairs, in lengths tapering from a couple at the hook to seven at the base, and dyed of a glass colour in a concoction of October ale, soot, walnut tree juice and alum, and, finally, of a box of natural stone-flies, hatched out from the caddis worms then swarming in great quantities in the brooks and burns. Now of these flies he took a brace, and, spitting them on the hook, head to tail, cautiously projected his rod, himself concealed, over a likely pool, and let the bait bob gently up and down near the surface of the water--in the process called indifferently daping or dibbing or dippling, which is to imitate the action of a fly dancing--when, to his delight, after his scarce beginning, he felt a jerk and pull at his rod top; and there were the flies gone under in the midst of an oily ring of water, and a lively weight tugging at his hold of them. He was so excited for the moment as quite to forget his heartache; but all his thoughts were concentrated on the glory of his capture, and whether, having no net, he would be able to land it without his line snapping. Holding himself cool, however, and biding his time, as Clerivault had taught him, he presently felt the efforts of the fish to slacken; when, with a steady lift, he raised it clear of the pool and swung it swiftly to the bank, where it lay kicking and gasping, a grayling good fifteen inches long. Surveying his prize with rapture, he stooped to release it from the hook, when, glancing up as he knelt, he saw something which on the instant struck him motionless. The side of the hill on which he looked sloped down to the glen, and was much confused with bush and foliage for two-thirds of its height; but above and beyond it broke into open spaces, which were multiplied continuously until a summit of bare grass was reached; and on this ridge, silhouetted against the sky, cropt a little donkey. Brion waited, while the shock of tingling blood in his veins subsided: then very hurriedly he rose, and, discarding fish and flies and tackle, began to climb the hill in as straight a line as he could make for the small dusk object perched up aloft. Picking his way by bush and boulder, he soon enough lost sight of it; but the open ground once reached would enable him to correct his course, and it was for that he was striving when a little suppressed cough, uttered from somewhere close at hand, brought him to a stop as instant as though he had answered to a ‘stand and deliver.’