'Hell is paved with hearsays, sir, and as all this talk of mine is
hearsay, if you are in earnest, sir, go and see for yourself. I
know you have a kind heart, and they tell me that you are a great
scholar, which would to God I was! so you ought not to condescend to
take my word for anything which you can look into yourself;' with
which sound piece of common-sense Tregarva returned busily to his
eel-lines.

'Hand me the rod and can, and help me out along the buck-stage,'
said Lancelot; 'I must have some more talk with you, my fine
fellow.'

'Amen,' answered Tregarva, as he assisted our lame hero along a huge
beam which stretched out into the pool; and having settled him
there, returned mechanically to his work, humming a Wesleyan hymn-
tune.

Lancelot sat and tried to catch perch, but Tregarva's words haunted
him. He lighted his cigar, and tried to think earnestly over the
matter, but he had got into the wrong place for thinking. All his
thoughts, all his sympathies, were drowned in the rush and whirl of
the water. He forgot everything else in the mere animal enjoyment
of sight and sound. Like many young men at his crisis of life, he
had given himself up to the mere contemplation of Nature till he had
become her slave; and now a luscious scene, a singing bird, were
enough to allure his mind away from the most earnest and awful
thoughts. He tried to think, but the river would not let him. It
thundered and spouted out behind him from the hatches, and leapt
madly past him, and caught his eyes in spite of him, and swept them