STEWART AND THE UPSTREAM SCHOOL. 101 



uncast, because it frights the fish; then 

 certainly it must do it this way, whether the 

 flie fall first or not, the line must first come to 

 the fish or fall on him which undoubtedly will 

 fright him : Therefore my opinion is, that you 

 angle down the River, for the other way you 

 traverse twice so much, and beat not so much 

 ground as downwards.' 



Several points call for particular notice. 

 First of all Venables meets with two different 

 opinions and practices, and therefore even in 

 the seventeenth century the two systems existed 

 side by side. Then he gives the argument. 

 The upstream man claims to keep out of sight. 

 But the downstream fisher effects the same 

 object by throwing a long line. That he must 

 throw a long line is true then and always. 

 There are still, and always have been, two 

 schools, those who use a long line down stream 

 and those who use a shorter line up. And 

 Venables also is emphatic on the danger of 

 lining your fish, a point often overlooked, but 

 one of great importance. It is instructive, by 

 the way, to see that it was as fatal to line a 

 fish two hundred and fifty years ago as it is 

 to-day. And he says, which is also true and 

 said for the first time, that in fishing straight 

 up his hair and our gut must go over the fish. 

 He also makes the point so often made since, 

 that upstream fishing means laborious wading 

 and covers less water than downstream. It is 

 interesting to find the argument put so com- 



