PREFACE. 



THE treatise, comprised in the follow- 

 ing sheets, has been long and loudly 

 called for. When I make this assertion, 

 I do not mean to censure by any criticism 

 it may at first sight seem to imply, the 

 labours of other writers on the same sub- 

 ject. I merely state a fact. That fact 

 must be an apology for my assuming in 

 the face of the public the superiority 

 certainly not on a matter of vital impor- 

 tance to society that is supposed to 

 attach to the character of authors. To 

 prove the fact, I shall write that which 

 every body in the neighbourhood knows 

 to be a true story. 



My father, the late William Shipley 

 of Ashborne, in which town he was born 

 and resided until he had fully completed 

 the term of years allotted to the age of 

 man, was the best fly-fisher that appeared 



