340 AMERICAN ANGLER'S BOOK. 



tree or two on the bank witli drooping boughs, Trout are apt 

 to collect there, for thej love the shade. Here, if the weather 

 is warm, they are not apt to rise with a splash, as I have just 

 remarked, but will suck in your fly with a mere dimp- 

 ling of the water, or you may have a vague sense of its 

 being arrested beneath the surface. Then strike sharply, but 

 do not be violent, and you have him ; try again, there are 

 more there,, and good ones. 



Never pass a piece of still water of reasonable depth where 

 a fresh spring brook, however diminutive, comes in, particu- 

 larly in warm weather. I have in my memory such a pool 

 bordered on one side with hair-grass and duck-weed, which I 

 had frequently passed heedlessly by, supposing it to be back- 

 water from the main stream, or left in the old bed of the 

 creek, from the overflow of the spring freshets. But one day, 

 seeing a quiet dimpling of the surface, I waded lazily in, and 

 threw my flies carelessly on the water, when a thirteen-incher 

 laid hold, and was away in the duck-weed before I recovered 

 from my astonishment. After many turns, however, and 

 much contention, the pliant little rod exhausted him. Thus 

 encouraged, I fished the shaded pool its whole length as noise- 

 lessly as an otter, and the result was a dozen very handsome 

 Trout. I never passed that pool again without giving it the 

 attention it merited. 



Sometimes on the subsiding of a freshet, Trout will sur- 

 mount a long rapid, and rest in a pool, or the smooth flow of 

 water above, Y,'here it is not a half yard in depth. Fish such 

 water with as long a cast as possible, and so as not to throw 

 your shadow over the swim. 



A brisk clattering little brook, as it rushes along over 

 rocks and logs, through the woods, washes out many a pretty 

 hole in its sharp turns, and amongst the big stones, where the 

 laurel and alders render casting impossible. The only way 



