72 BEETLES. 



enjoyment of as fair a degree of favour as 

 it deserves ; for it is one of the most killins: 

 insects used, and particularly in April, when, in 

 the finest, brightest water, it will be found ad- 

 mirable. The cases which enclose the wings of 

 this species are so very small, scarcely extending 

 over one-third of its body, that it is quite as 

 well to make it in the ordinary manner of 

 dressing a fly ; more especially, too, as, when it 

 alights on the water, its wings are most com- 

 monly extended, not only beyond the cases, 

 which ought to cover them in a .state of repose, 

 but beyond the body itself. 



If the fly-fisher will take the trouble to open 

 the stomachs of Trout, almost at any season, he 

 will very often find part of their contents to 

 consist of one or other of the Beetle tribe ; a 

 lesson, I imagine, well worth the learning. On 

 one occasion, at Monmouth Cap, on the Mon- 

 now, when the Trout were rising in all di- 

 rections, and I had tried a great variety of 

 flies without effect, I at last captured a very 

 little fellow ; and, in order to ascertain what he 

 had been taking, I cut him open, and found. 



