204 FLY FISHING FOB TKOUT. 



though written considerably more than a 

 century before I was born. In this I believe it 

 to stand alone. True, other books have had 

 longer lives and more editions. The Treatise, 

 through Mascall who copied it, lasted till 

 Walton's time. The Compleat Angler of 

 course is still being republished every few 

 years. But the success of Bowlker, writing in 

 the mid-eighteenth century against numerous 

 competitors, is far more notable than that of 

 Dame Juliana, writing three centuries earlier 

 against none. And Walton is reprinted not as 

 a fisherman but as a writer. So Bowlker 

 remains the most successful purely fishing book 

 ever written. His prose is simple and not 

 unpleasing. He says of fly fishing, 'Even the 

 preparation of the Materials for the artificial 

 Fly, and the skill and contrivance in making 

 them, and comparing them with the natural, 

 is a very pleasing amusement : The manner of 

 the Fishes taking them, which is by rising to 

 the surface of the water, and sometimes out of 

 it, gives the Angler a very agreeable surprize.' 

 Which is pleasantly told. Bowlker was obser- 

 vant of nature, and well-read in angling books. 

 His account of the transformations of the May- 

 fly is worth looking at even to-day. His great 

 merit is that he gives old ideas a good shaking 

 up and fishing a fresh outlook. He clears away 

 a lot of lumber. I have already told how he 

 freed us for all time from the obsession of flies 

 which had come down from the Treatise : flies 



