TROUTING.

'NEATH the shadow of a forest,

Where the breezes murmured low,

And a merry, laughing brooklet

Wound its way to fields below;

Where the spray-drops, lightly dashing,

Danced and flirted in the air,

Stood a ledge of rock, o'erhanging,

Fair to view, a grotto there.

Underneath 't was clean and mossy,

Cool and shady all about,

While a little pool beside it

Sheltered many a speckled trout.

And it happened that a maiden,

Fair as maiden e'er could be,

Sat there idly in the sunset,

Deep in Hugo's "Ninety-Three."

And it also happened, strangely,

That a student, fishing near,

Wandering down the brooklet's border,

Chanced to wander idly here;

And with stealthy step approaching,

Noiselessly, for trout are shy,

There he softly o'er the edges

Dropped his most successful fly.

Ah, a bite! With eager haste, he

Drew it up with sudden fling;

Then a maiden's voice rose wildly,

"O, my head! You horrid thing!"

And she came, with tears and blushes,

Forth from out the grotto there,

With the fly - "the most successful" -

Tangled in her flowing hair.

Need we paint the scene that followed, -

Tears of crystal, blushes chaste, -

How, at length consoled, the student

Stole an arm around her waist?

Enough to know that e'er the autumn

Thrice its treasures shall have shed,

One more maiden will have promised,

One more student will have wed.

WALLINGFORD.