214 ANGLERS' EVENINGS. 



it is very unsafe to dogmatise on the subject at all. 

 Fish — trout especially — are such maggoty creatures (if I 

 may be allowed the use of this expression in its 

 secondary meaning), that they will insist by their conduct 

 upon a large number of exceptions to most rules you can 

 lay down for them. In the broad general principle that, 

 in consequence of their being very sharp-eyed, it is better 

 to keep out of sight, I am a thorough believer ; and if 

 it were equally convenient upon all occasions, in the case 

 at least of a burn, I should certainly always fish up. But 

 circumstances may interfere. Fishing up, for instance, 

 may take us away from our train, when fishing down 

 would land us at the station just at the proper time. But 

 even though the angler may find it more convenient to 

 fish down than up on sojne occasions, there is no reason 

 why he should do what Stewart tells us some of his 

 disciples were guilty of, while all the time they fancied 

 they were following implicitly the precepts of his book. 

 He says : — 



" We have met anglers fishing down stream — and this is no sup- 

 positious case, but one wliich we have seen over and over again— M'ith a 

 copy of this volume (the Practical Angler) in their pockets, who 

 complained that they had got everything herein recommended, and were 

 getting no sport. On pointing out to them that there was one important 

 mistake they were committing in fishing down stream instead of up, they 

 stated that when they came to a pool they fished it up — that is to say, they 

 first walked down the pool and showed themselves to the trout, and then 

 commenced to fish for them." 



These were certainly very ignorant anglers ; but the 

 fault lay, not so much in fishing down as in fishing after 

 being in full view of the trout. For the most part, perhaps, 



