ASH OR WILLOW BUTS. 29 



standing that a top maybe very well, in good hands, 

 without whalebone, I can at the same time see 

 no disadvantage in having it : and it is, assuredly, 

 less liable to fracture, (if fracture be possible), 

 than any wood of the same thickness could be. 

 Besides, as has been observed elsewhere, if, in 

 carrying a rod, you happened to poke it, point 

 foremost, against the ground, or a tree, it is ten 

 to one a wooden tip would fly. A recent work 

 on Fly-fishing, Shipley and Fitzgibbon, at page 

 35, quotes Bambridge as an authority, and re- 

 commends that " whatever number of pieces the 

 rod is to be composed of, between the but and 

 the top-piece, they must all be cut from the same 

 log." This mode of advice I cannot understand, 

 for, in the following page, they recommend as 

 many various woods to be used in a rod as I do. 



ASH OR WILLOW BUTS. According to the 

 work before alluded to, the but of a rod should 

 be of willow, on account of its lightness, rejecting 

 ash as too heavy. This merely alludes to trout- 

 rods, however, whilst my remarks equally apply 

 to those for trout or salmon. Willow is much 

 lighter than hiccory, and if you put an hiccory 

 joint above a willow but, how can you, unless 

 the but be very thick and clumsy, obtain an 

 equally graduated weight throughout the rod ? 

 Besides which, you will find that weight in the 

 hand is advantageous, and surely a trout rod of 



