VI PREFATORY NOTE. 



suggestions. His articles were eagerly looked for 

 by all who take more than a superficial interest 

 in fly dressing, and certainly deserve the very 

 high praise given them by " Val Conson," than 

 whom there is no better judge living, and I 

 cannot do better than reproduce his note here. 



DEATH OF "ATHENIAN." 



DEAR MARSTON. You have doubtless received from 

 the family of the contributor who wrote in your pages 

 over the singularly appropriate name of " Athenian " 

 the announcement of his death. It was only in corre- 

 spondence, both private and in your columns, I had to 

 do with him ; but I should like to say this, that in him 

 the art of fly dressing has lost, at a very early age, 

 probably the most prolific, ingenious, and inventive 

 intellect of the century. He was always eager to hear 

 and to tell some new thing, and the new thing he told 

 was nearly always of his own discovery. In controversy 

 he was always a fair and courteous opponent, and as a 

 correspondent he was generous to a degree in his com- 

 munication of what he thought would interest or help. 



Thus, though I never had the pleasure of meeting 

 him, his early death touches me with a sense of per- 

 sonal loss, in which you, I feel sure, will share, and 

 I should like, as one of the many readers of the Fishing 

 Gazette who has had the benefit of perusing his singu- 

 larly clear and exhaustive contributions, to testify, 

 through your columns, to those he leaves behind him 

 how warmly we appreciated him and liow sincerely we 

 deplore his loss. Very truly yours, 



VAL CONSON. 



It was Sunday, July 3, 1898, that my corre- 

 spondent died ; and his brother, Mr. Herbert S. 

 McClelland, in sending me the news on July 7, 

 said : 



" My dear brother, who has been writing under 

 the name of ' Athenian ' in your paper, passed 

 away on Sunday last. It is exactly six years 

 since he and I came home from school, before the 



