CHAPTER SIX SALMON FISHING 



clear water, with artificial fly or minnow. Nothing can be 

 more unlike the ''worm" described as forming one end of 

 the thing called a fishing-rod, than the gay and gaudy col- 

 lection of feathers and tinsel which form the attraction of 

 a Findhorn fly. Let us look at the salmon-fly, which I have 

 just finished, and which now lies on the table before me, 

 ready for trial in some clear pool of the river. To begin: I 

 tie with well-waxed silk a portion of silkworms' intestines 

 on a highly-tempered and finished Limerick-made hook. 

 Here are three different substances brought into play 

 already. I next begin at the tail of the fly: first come two 

 turns of gold thread, then a tenth part of an inch of red 

 floss-silk; next comes the tail, consisting of a bright gold 

 feather from the crest of the golden pheasant. The body is 

 now to be made of, alternately, a stripe of green, a stripe 

 of blue, and the remainder of orange- coloured floss-silk, 

 with a double binding of gold thread and silver tinsel; the 

 legs are made of a black barn-door cock's hackle, taken 

 from him, in winter, when the bird is in full plumage; next 

 to the wing comes a turn of grouse's feather, and two or 

 three turns of the purple-black feather which is pendant 

 on the breast of an oldcockheron. Nowfor the wing, which 

 is composed of a mixtureof feathers from themallardkilled 

 in this country; from the teal drake, also a native; from the 

 turkey-cock; the bustard, from India; a stripe or two of 

 green parrot; a little of the tippet of the gold pheasant; a 

 thread or two from the peacock's tail; a bit from the Argus 

 pheasant, and from the tail of a common hen pheasant: all 

 these mixed and blended together form an irresistible wing. 

 Round the shoulder of the wing a turn of the blue and black 

 89 



