TROUTING. 25 



midst of rare sport. By the way, pay no regard to the 

 list of fancy flies which sportsmen often make so much 

 aJo about. The red and black hackles are the best for 

 our latitude all seasons of the year. With this short 

 episode, follow me in fancy, down the stream, packing 

 the bright spotted trout away into my basket, until wo 

 come to a dark overhanging precipice. Here the 

 stream flows in a broad sheet against and under the 

 mountain, and disappears from sight to appear again far- 

 ther on. This precipice, shooting at an angle of 45 de- 

 grees over the current, turning it back on itself, and 

 forcing it downward, forms a deep, black pool, covered 

 with the foam-bubbles which circle and dart like live 

 creatures in the eddies. There, on the very edge of the 

 eddy, I have cast my fly. It has hardly moved before, 

 look I what a noble fellow makes the water foam as he 

 throws an arch into the air, his white belly gleaming 

 like a silver arrow as he goes. Snap goes the line, and 

 he vanishes. AJi, he was a fat one, and that last fling 

 of his by which he cleared himself, made every nerve 

 in me tingle. 



But I will have his mate. Quickly noosing another 

 snell, I drag again the deep pool, and there the other 



shf)ots — the beauty, and T have him ; I cannot play 

 9 



