This afternoon is going to last for ever.
You note and enjoy and savour the little pleasures unhurried by the
thought that anything else, whether of pleasure or duty, is to follow.
And so for long delicious eons. The River flows on, ever on; the hills
watch, watch always; the birds sing, the sun shines grateful across
your shoulders; the big trout and the little rise in predestined order,
and make their predestined fight, and go their predestined way either
to liberty or the creel; the pools and the rapids and the riffles slip
by upstream as though they had been withdrawn rather than as though you
had advanced.
Then suddenly the day has dropped its wings. The earth moves forward
with a jar. Things are to be accomplished; things are being
accomplished. The River is hurrying down to the Lake; the birds have
business of their own to attend to, an it please you; the hills are
waiting for something that has not yet happened, but they are ready.
Startled, you look up. The afternoon has finished. Your last step has
taken you over the edge of the shadow cast by the setting sun across
the range of hills.
For the first time you look about you to see where you are. It has not
mattered before. Now you know that shortly it will be dark. Still
remain below you four pools. A great haste seizes you.
"If I take my rod apart and strike through the woods," you argue, "I
can make the Narrows, and I am sure there is a big trout there.
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