THE FLY QUESTION 107 



depend. Nearly all of them serve both for wet 

 and dry-fly work, with, of course, the necessary 

 difference in build in the case of the winged flies. 

 And nearly all of them are applicable for either 

 chalk streams or mountain rivers. Some of them 

 serve equally well for lake fishing, though for that 

 I would add a few purely fancy patterns which 

 I should not think necessary for river work, and 

 also one or two imitations of the gnats and midges 

 which are important on still waters. 



There is, to my mind, no hard and fast line between 

 chalk streams and other waters in the matter of 

 appropriate flies, and a pattern considered specially 

 designed for one district may do equally well in 

 the other. The half stone and the blue upright 

 convinced me of this. Both are essentially Devon- 

 shire flies by tradition. But both are extremely 

 valuable for chalk stream fishing. The pattern 

 of half stone which I use is as a matter of fact a 

 Welsh dressing, bigger and more straggly than the 

 Devonshire variety, but it is practically the same 

 fly in essentials. It is not particularly like anything 

 you find on a chalk stream, but the fish seem to take 

 to it very kindly whether fished dry or wet in the 

 minor tactics fashion. It must be an excellent 

 instance of the typical fly. I have not the least 

 doubt that many of the essentially wet-fly patterns 

 of which there is such a large variety would give 



