Some say the fishing season will end in fire, some say in ice.

(My apologies to Robert Frost).

The fire is, I suppose, in the autumn leaves, or the sunset-orange of a brook trout's belly in spawning time. The ice? It was in the air in the form of snowflakes on Saturday, and on the ground as window-panes over the puddles left by Wednesday's rain.

So maybe the season ends in fire and ice.

The Bro was on the Pool hours before I got there on Thursday, and was grinning and shaking his head in wonder when I arrived. He'd had a big day, landing a salmon (to the applause of several other anglers including the warden) of 25 inches and maybe five pounds, and a 20-inch brookie that "wasn't the longest I've ever caught but easily the heaviest." My own angling achievements were modest in comparison and need not be discussed in detail here.

The weather was the star of the show, though, marching vigorously through a dazzling variety of routines, from a balmy Thursday to a cold, rainy Friday, to an impossibly windy, cold and even snowy Saturday and finally to a crisp but sunny Sunday on which most of the fish were apparently locked away in Sunday school. The only angler I saw who was having any success was a New Hampshireman who was hooking and netting a steady succession of salmon and brook trout, all while standing on the same rock. When I boldly waded over and asked what he was using, he smiled and said, "I thought you'd never ask." He then gave me a fly (fly?) I had never used before, an "egg-sucking leech," with a sleek black maribou body and a pink pompom for a head. Sure enough, on about the third cast I hooked a salmon, but I destroyed the fly removing it from the salmon's jaw with forceps and was back where I started.

One more weekend left in the season, and I will go once more to the Pool, cast a few for Auld Lang Syne, button up the camp for the winter and retreat to home and hearth to start counting the days til Opening Day.