262 FLIES AND KNOTS. 
body, and I hit on them accidentally after trying a great 
variety. 
Hackles, in onr Long Island ponds, are, by universal 
testimony, a failure, and the palmers worthless; and 
throughout the breadth and length of our country, the 
winged flies are vastly preferable. The hackles and 
palm_ers are intended to represent the caterpillars, which 
our fish very sensibly ignore alongside of the innumer- 
able beautiful, delicate and gaudy flies, and which under 
no circumstances are found except in the fresh-water 
brooks. Through all the early Spring, the stomachs 
of the trout will be found filled with the shells of the 
caddis, and these, if they could be obtained, would 
doubtless be a killing bait. Fortunately they cannot be, 
and are not to my knowledge used here at all. 
In our mountain streams the fish are generally 
extremely numerous, though small, and will eagerly 
seize any fly presented to them, vying with one another 
to be first. The following is a good assortment, and will, 
in addition to those already mentioned, be sufficient for 
all waters : The alder-fly, English partridge hackle, 
hackles of all colors, red and black ants, the devil-fly 
with a yellow body, the tail of one red and one black 
whisk, black hackles and red and black wings, dark 
mackerel, red spinner, English blue jay, fern-fly, orange 
dun, the camlets of various colors, grey, dun and black 
midges, the coachman, the ^tone-fly, the May-flies, 
millers for night-work, the sand-fly, the various other 
duns, the turkey brown, and a large light grey fly. 
As each maker employs diflerent colors and feathers 
for the same fly, these descriptions are rather indefinite ; 
