70 BY MOOK AND BY CROOK. 



one's very best and hoping against hope ; and the best 

 plan is to send him home, as, apart from the annoyance 

 occasioned by his, or it may even be her, company, 

 one's attention is continually being distracted, and a 

 fish may be missed, a disappointment we have before 

 now experienced. Again, some anglers will waste a 

 deal of their time in walking backwards and forwards 

 between pools, being apparently of opinion that the 

 one they are fishing at any particular moment affords 

 less chance of sport than some other, the result being 

 that none are properly fished ; and we have known 

 valuable hours wasted in walking to a pool miles away, 

 when the probability of sport was quite as great in 

 others close at hand : these vagaries are sound enough 

 from a tourist point of view, but they will not commend 

 themselves to the angler who likes to keep his fly in 

 the water. 



When after a flood the water is still very big, but 

 yet of such a colour that it be possible for fish to see 

 the fly, the angler may prefer to go out on the off- 

 chance ; but he should remember that when the water 

 is big enough for fish to run in, they will not frequent 

 the usual spots, but lie in towards the banks out of the 

 stream, which is as yet too strong for them; so even 

 if the height of the water would allow, he had much 

 better give up all idea of wading and cast from the 

 bank. 



Under such conditions he should drop his fly on the 

 edge of the stream, and allow it to work round as near 



