172 SPRING FISHING. 



dun (No. 2 in our list) dressed with dark mate- 

 rials, or the red fly for the dropper, with the red 

 palmer for stretcher, all dressed full and on 

 hooks Nos. 3 and 4, Kendal, are as good as any 

 that can be selected. In Devonshire, the almost 

 universal use of the red palmer has passed into 

 a proverb, and the fame of the fly is certainly 

 not undeserved. Its general colour is of that 

 "happy medium" which harmonises with most 

 states of the water and atmosphere, and the 

 numerous shades to which it may be varied, 

 in its hackle, and by the omission or otherwise of 

 gold or silver twist on its body render it 

 peculiarly valuable. We therefore strongly re- 

 commend its use in the spring and autumn, 

 dressing it with gold twist only for dark and 

 windy days. We do not like a purely red hackle 

 so well as one with a black list or a furnace 

 hackle, as it is called that is, a hackle with 

 red tips and black close to the quill, as 

 already described in the Chapter on Fly- 

 making. The blue dun, also, as we have before 

 stated, forms an excellent lure, and is not at all 

 less deservedly famed than the palmer. Like the 

 latter, too, its colour admits of so much varia- 

 tion the shades of blue being so numerous 

 that it will suit almost every state of the water 



