294 GAME FISH OF NORTH AMERICA. 



mouth of cool gravelly brooks, whither they resort to make their 

 beds. 



Their habits change with their age. When very young they 

 play a great deal together, usually choosing the parts of the brook 

 which have a muddy bottom, and will sometimes if startled, sud- 

 denly bury themselves in the mud. This, however, does not often 

 occur ; they usually make for the first little projection that juts out 

 over the water, and there hide until the danger is over. As they 

 grow older they seem to dissolve partnership in a great measure, 

 and every one chooses his own particular hiding place, the larger 

 trout taking, as if by reason of their superior strength, which to 

 all appearance is understood among them, the deepest holes and 

 largest projecting sods, and leaving the smaller ones for their less 

 officious kin. The older they grow the more wary they become, 

 and therefore it requires considerable skill to catch a vei7 old 

 trout. A worm is, generally speaking, the best bait for them, 

 but in the spring, after the rains that usually prevail at that sea- 

 son, which wash a great many worms and insects into the water, 

 very few of which escape their observation, they bite better at the 

 more tempting bait of a fly. Instruction in trout fishing is not 

 easily imparted. It must be acquired chiefly by practice and ob- 

 serv^ation. The knowledge of where to fish is moreover fully as 

 essential as the knowing how to fish. Some study of entomology 

 is requisite at the outset. Some acquaintance with the creatures 

 that live in the water, under the water, and over the water, and 

 whose habits in great part govern or control the movements of 

 the fish. We are to know that certain flies deposit their eggs on 

 the leaves of the plants that overhang the streams ; that such and 

 such ephemera launch their floating boats of eggs upon the water 

 itself ; that certain larvae are to be found among the weeds at the 

 bottom. We are to know just at what locality upon the stream 

 these are to be found, and at what month of the year they will de- 

 velop into active life, because where the food is there the fish do 

 congregate. This knowledge is important, for it enables the 

 angler to select the choice places for his casts, and prevents waste 

 of time in testing spots where success is improbable. Into this 

 study of entomology also enters all the minutiee of patterns for 

 artificial flies, and the selection of such specimens for casts as will 



