Every morning he would lead me away through the heather to some lonely loch on the shoulders of the hills, from which we could look down upon the Northern Sea and the blue Orkney Isles far away across the Pentland Firth. Sometimes we would find a loch with a boat on it, and drift up and down, casting along the shores. Sometimes, in spite of Sandy's confident predictions, no boat could be found, and then I must put on the Mackintosh trousers and wade out over my hips into the water, and circumambulate the pond, throwing the flies as far as possible toward the middle, and feeling my way carefully along the bottom with the long net-handle, while Sandy danced on the bank in an agony of apprehension lest his Predestinated Opportunity should step into a deep hole and be drowned. It was a curious fact in natural history that on the lochs with boats the trout were in the shallow water, but in the boatless lochs they were away out in the depths. "Juist the total depraivity o' troots," said Sandy, "an' terrible fateegin'."Sandy had an aversion to commit himself to definite statements on any subject not theological. If you asked him how long the morning's tramp would be, it was "no verra long, juist a bit ayant the hull yonner." And if, at the end of the seventh mile, you complained that it was much too far, he would never do more than admit that "it micht be shorter." If you called him to rejoice over a trout that weighed close upon two pounds, he allowed that it was "no bad--but there's bigger anes i' the loch gin we cud but wile them oot." And at lunch-time, when we turned out a full basket of shining fish on the heather, the most that he would say, while his eyes snapped with joy and pride, was, "Aweel, we canna complain, the day."Then he would gather an armful of dried heather-stems for kindling, and dig out a few roots and crooked limbs of the long-vanished forest from the dry, brown, peaty soil, and make our campfire of prehistoric wood--just for the pleasant, homelike look of the blaze--and sit down beside it to eat our lunch. Heat is the least of the benefits that man gets from fire. It is the sign of cheerfulness and good comradeship. I would not willingly satisfy my hunger, even in a summer nooning, without a little flame burning on a rustic altar to consecrate and enliven the feast. When the bread and cheese were finished and the pipes were filled with Virginia tobacco, Sandy would begin to tell me, very solemnly and respectfully, about the mistakes I had made in the fishing that day, and mourn over the fact that the largest fish had not been hooked. There was a strong strain of pessimism in Sandy, and he enjoyed this part of the sport immensely.
同类推荐
热门推荐
暖婚boss:一不小心爱上你
“脱掉。”“嗯?老婆是想看看为夫的尺寸能否让你满意吗?”“不,我只是想让你试试我的手法。”试过后,男人差点下不了床,还上了瘾。在夏城谁人不知谁人不晓,宁得罪阎罗王,切莫得罪陆爷,可姬情却一不小心将陆爷给睡了。结果反被骗婚骗身骗心,还被怀着孕的三儿找上门来。她伤心欲绝的将离婚协议书甩到陆爷身上,“老婆别怕,今晚不是高难度的姿势,不过,我想换个地方,你说是阳台好呢还是楼下的游泳池好?”豪门独爱:娇妻太撩人
要说谁最悲催,非苏笑莫属,自从遇见权势惊人的叶寒墨,人生从此一片黑暗,后又发现关系好到同居的闺密竟是个男的,被他吃尽豆腐,苏笑表示,真是生无可恋,论悲催,谁又比的上她?某日,一美女哭着跑到叶寒墨面前,状告苏笑要杀她,某男斜眤她一眼,冷声道,“你死没有?”那美女一愣,摇摇头,某男偏头看向苏笑,语气颇为嫌弃,“没用的东西,一个女人都弄不死,难道要我亲自动手?”