THE TINKER. 41 



the necessary colour and description. I have seen him, with 

 Job-like patience, labouring through endless papers and 

 parcels, in search of a paltry insect that I could fabricate in 

 five minutes. 



"His companion, Captain B , ran into an opposite 



extreme. He rarely had a second casting-line, and seldom 

 a second set of flies. Did the day change, or the river fill 

 or lower, he sat down on the bank, ripped wings and dub- 

 bings from his hooks, and prepared a new outfit in a twinkling. 

 I never met an angler who was so certain of filling a basket 



as my friend B . His system, however, I would totally 



disapprove of. Without burthening oneself with enough to 

 furnish out a tackle-shop, a small and effective collection is 

 desirable ; and it is absurd to lose a fortunate half-hour tying 

 on the river bank, what could be more conveniently fabricated 

 during the tedium of a wet day within doors. An accident 

 may rob the most discreet angler of his flies, and surely it is 

 necessary to have a fresh relay to put up. But though I take 

 a sufficiency along with me, I never leave home without being 

 provided with the materials for constructing new ones. An 

 hour may bring ephemerae on the waters, which you must 

 imitate, or you will cast in vain ; before evening they have 

 vanished and given place to some new variety of the insect 

 world. Thus far, at least, the tyer possesses an advantage 

 over him who cannot produce a fly, that no collection which 

 human ingenuity can form will compensate. 



" The best practical lesson I ever got originated in the 

 following accidental occurrence. Some years ago I received 

 private information, that a travelling tinker, who occasionally 

 visited these mountains to make and repair the tin stills used 

 by the peasantry in illicit distillation, was in the constant 

 habit of destroying fish, and he was represented as being a 

 most successful poacher. I was returning down the river after 

 an unfavourable day, a wearied and a disappointed fisherman, 

 and observed, at a short distance, a man chased across the 

 bogs by several others, and eventually overtaken and secured. 

 It was the unfortunate tinker, surprised by the keepers in the 

 very act of landing a splendid salmon ; two, recently killed, 

 were discovered in his wallet, and yet that blessed day I could 

 not hook a fish ! He was forthwith brought in durance before 

 my honour, to undergo the pains and penalties of his crime. 

 He was a strange, raw-boned,- wild-looking animal, and I 



