ON ANGLING. 115 



Now, if you have been able to reconstruct, by help of 

 my words above, the circumstances of the case, you will at 

 once appreciate the value of the wavy line. Whereas, when 

 the line is straight the current at once begins to drift it down 

 and so communicates drag to the cast, the energy of the 

 current on the wavy line is first spent in straightening out, 

 or transforming into one extensive curve, those several 

 lesser curves, and it is not until that is done that the reel-line 

 begins to drag the fly ; by which time the fly may have 

 gone over the fish's head. If it have not — ah, consummation 

 devoutly to be wished ! — actually gone down his throat. 



I have known one or two men who were very expert 

 fishers indeed, in the sense of their ability to throw a straight 

 and a light line, and yet who failed to catch half as many fish 

 on a dry-fly river as their craft really entitled them to expect, 

 just because they did not appreciate what is, indeed, the very 

 obvious truth that I have tried to set out above. One in 

 particular, on the Test, lately deceased and lamented by every 

 friend who knew him as the best and least selfish of sportsmen, 

 caught relatively few fish, though he could throw a beautiful 

 line, until someone, in an unhappy hour for the trout, led him 

 to realise that his line of lovely correctness was not only 

 wasted on the fish of that river, but that they would far more 

 readily take a fly shown them at the end of a line lying in 

 what appeared, by comparison, to be slovenly curves. Once 

 he had realised it he easily modified his practice accordingly, 

 with results which immediately threw very many of the best 

 trout families into heavy mourning. 



Thus far, since we have been on our chalk stream, I 

 have supposed you to be throwing for a fish well out from you 

 in the water ; but one which you will constantly find, and 

 a fish, moreover, which offers you a very fair prospect 

 of forming a closer acquaintance with him, is the fish that 

 rises close under your own bank. Creeping up, you will be 

 able to get almost behind him. In this instance, if you were 

 to cast your ordinary line, with some wavy slack, that would 

 involve some small length of the gut passing over his head 

 before the fly reached him. If he noticed the gut he would 

 be apt to greet the fly with a very cold and unresponsive 

 eye. There is a peculiar cast which you should try to make 



