290 Fly-rods and Fly-tackle. 



ter was unchanged. That, and the intervening day, were 

 fair, and as like the day first mentioned as one pea is like 

 another. Yet though we really worked hard, and de- 

 voted the entire day to it, the total catch of the whole 

 party would hardly amount to two dozen. Never in all 

 my experience there had I seen such an utter failure of 

 sport. Why was it ? It was not because we had fished 

 the place out on the first occasion, since we did not then 

 kill twenty fish altogether, nor had the stream been fished 

 in the mean time. 



For years, between the 10th of September and the 1st 

 of October, the outlet of that lake has invariably been as 

 a bank, on which one could always draw for large fish, 

 with the certainty that his efforts would be honored. 

 Yet last year the utmost diligence was fruitless. The 

 large fish did not "show up" there at all, those that 

 were taken being found at other, and hitherto not very 

 fruitful localities. It was not because the fish were gone, 

 since they swarmed in the preceding spring ; and during 

 the very time when they were so misusing us, they could 

 be seen and heard on any still evening breaking into and 

 through schools of minnows all over the lake. Again 

 and again I have had excellent fishing in the morning, 

 while the afternoon spent in the same places has been 

 quite barren, and vice versa. 



I have at times thought I knew something about 

 the habits of trout, and that I could approximate in 

 the morning to the probable sport of that day, but I 

 now freely admit I know little or nothing about them. 

 That trout are governed by something it is reasonable 

 to suppose ; but why they should throng together at 

 one time and vanish at another why they should take 

 the most transparent fraud on one occasion, and with- 



