ARMING THE GUT. 71 



upwards, and the barbed part downwards, as 

 represented in the little plate before you. You 

 next take a strand of fine silk, neatly waxed, and 

 about a foot or more in length, and you whip it 

 two or three times firmly round the hook at that 

 part of it nearest your finger-nails, or, generally 

 speaking, that part of the shank which is opposite 

 to the pointed and barbed part of the hook. You 

 make the two or three whips in the direction of 

 the end of the shank of the hook, that is, towards 

 your right. Next you take a link of gut coiled 

 for convenience' sake, as you see in the cut ; and 

 having softened between your lips, and drawn 

 between your teeth to soften and flatten it, a 

 small portion of the freed end of the gut, you 

 place that end against the last whip that you 

 have made with your silk, and you wind your 

 silk over gut and hook up to the end of the 

 shank, or up to that part of it from which you 

 see in the cut a portion of the silk hanging. 

 Wind your silk firmly, and in regular twists, and 

 one winding will be sufficient to fasten safely 

 your hook and gut together. If you only wind 

 your silk as far as you see it wound on the hook 

 before you, a very small portion of the end of the 

 shank will be bare, and leave more room for you 

 to make the head of the fly, and fasten off there 

 with greater delicacy. On the other hand, if 

 you wind your waxed silk to the end of the 



