they had been in the air six hours has placed them in a tub of water and found two-thirds of the number immediately “kick” and plunge with an amount of energy and ability that threw the water in all directions.  These fish had been caught at various times during the day, and as each was taken from the hook a stout leather strap was forced through the floor of its mouth beneath its tongue, and the bunch of fish so secured allowed to trail overboard in the stream.  They were thus dragged all day against a powerful current, but never showed any symptoms of “drowning.”  In the evening they were strung upon a stout piece of clothes-line, and after lying for some time on the railway platform were transferred to the floor of the baggage-car, and so transported to the city.  It is quite evident that we do not live in the fear of Mr. Bergh.  But what is one to do?  The fish is not to be discouraged except by the exhibition of great and brutal violence.  In fact, bass will not be induced to decently decease by any civilized process short of a powerful shock from a voltaic pile administered in the region of their medulla oblongata.  Of course, one cannot be expected to carry about a voltaic pile and go hunting for the medullary recesses of a savage and turbulent fish.  On the other hand, one may batter the protoplasm out of a refractory subject by the aid of a small rock, but it won’t improve the fish’s looks or cooking qualities.  It may seem like high treason to mention, moreover, at a safe distance from Mr. Bergh, that euthanasia in animals designed for the table does not always improve their quality, and in fact that the linked misery long drawn out of a protracted dissolution imparts a certain tenderness and flavor to the flesh that it would not otherwise possess.  Should that excellent and most estimable gentleman regard this statement with a sceptical eye, let it be here stated that the bass should be recently killed, split, crimped and broiled to a delicate brown, with a little good butter and a sprinkling of pepper, salt and chopped parsley.  Should he pursue the subject upon this basis, he will not be the first gentleman who has surrendered his convictions and compounded a culinary felony upon favorable terms.

Below Harper’s Ferry there is one of the most picturesque reaches of the Potomac River.  From the rugged heights that frown upon that historic and lovely spot, where the Shenandoah strikes away through the pass that leads to the broad and beautiful Valley of Virginia, and where John Brown’s memory struggles through battered ruins and the invading smoke of the unhallowed locomotive, the river chafes from side to side of the stern defile that hems it in and curbs its restless waters.  Great walls of dark rocks, crested by serried ranks of solemn pines, stand guard above its fitful, surging flood, and against the dark blue calm and misty depth of its gorge the pale smoke rises in a quiet column above the mills and houses that nestle by the river’s bed.  Huge boulders