144 FLY FISHING FOR TROUT. 



form can be no disadvantage, and that the 

 closer we can get to nature the better. But as 

 to what colour is to a fish and how it looks from 

 under the water, I cannot do better than refer 

 the enquirer to two striking books recently 

 produced by Mr. Francis Ward, Marvels of 

 Fish Life and Animal Life Under Water, 

 which break ground hitherto unexplored. Also 

 there is much new and stimulating matter in 

 Mr. J. C. Mottram's Fly Fishing. With that 

 I shall say no more. 



The best way to realise the course of progress 

 is to choose a few natural flies which must have 

 been distinguished by fishermen from the 

 beginning of time and to see how succeeding 

 ages have copied them. I suggest that the 

 following twelve form as good a list as any : 

 February Red, Grannom, Olive Dun, Yellow 

 Dun, March Brown, Iron Blue, Stonefly, 

 Mayfly, Red Spinner, Black Gnat, Red Sedge 

 and Alder. All these flies are easily recognised 

 and well known. The entomologist might 

 protest, and deny a separate entity to the 

 Yellow Dun, but I should silence him by appeal- 

 ing to the universal though inaccurate opinion 

 of anglers. The earliest list of flies is in the 

 Treatise in 1496, which contains twelve flies, 

 copied from nature, as I hope to show. Mascall 

 in 1590 annexed it with little variation, and 

 Markham about twenty-five years later copied 

 Mascall, but in some notable ways improved and 

 explained the dressings. Walton, however, 



