135 



to any living fly or insect whatever?" The 

 professor recommends the employment of 

 "colours to attract the notice of the fish." 

 Unhappily-chosen word! What things do 

 those great imitators of nature the poet 

 and the painter use ? Colours ! Do we 

 not say the colouring of that poem is good, 

 the colouring of that picture is bad. Why 

 good? Because the colouring bears a resem- 

 blance to a certain appearance possessed by 

 the object intended to be depicted or imi- 

 tated. Why bad? For the very converse 

 reason, because there is lack of resemblance 

 in a particular appearance. Let us now ask 

 Mr. Professor Rennie what colours he recom- 

 mends. Undoubtedly he will recommend 

 some particular ones. Will he say that they 

 are colours unlike those presented to the eye 

 on the bodies and their members of water-flies? 

 If he do, he will be inconsistent. Will he say 

 that they are to be colours like those pre- 

 sented to the sight by the bodies, &c. of 

 water-flies ? If he do, he will still be incon- 

 sistent with himself. He has got completely 

 between a cleft stick, and nothing but an 

 honest recantation of his heresy will get him 

 out of it. But we hope he will tell us the 

 peculiar colours that are to be used to draw 

 fish to them. It may be said, that, when the 



