134 TROUT FISHING 



enough case for me to go forward in confidence 

 none the less. 



The arguments against minor tactics are mainly 

 two, one that the method is of very little service, 

 the other that even if it be of service it offends 

 against the proprieties. The first argument seems 

 to me unsound and the second absurd. To deal 

 with them in turn : My own small experience has 

 proved to me conclusively that you can catch chalk 

 stream trout with a wet fly carefully delivered up 

 or across stream, and that the capture of an indivi- 

 dual feeding fish is to be achieved in this way just 

 as readily (in certain circumstances) as with a 

 floating fly. I have heard some of tlie more rigid 

 purists admit that a few of the smaller fish in a 

 chalk stream may perhaps be fools enough to take 

 a wet fly, but assert that nothing big would ever 

 so far demean itself. 



This by no means accords with the facts so far 

 as my own experience has gone. The two-pounder 

 is just as likely to take a wet fly properly presented 

 as the pounder, and it is merely a question of finding 

 either in the right frame of mind. It may not be 

 very important, but it seems to me to have some 

 significance that both my biggest fish from the Itchen 

 (they weighed two and a half pounds apiece) were 

 taken with a wet fly. One was so caught more or 

 less by accident — ^that is to say, I intended to put 



