90 BROOK AND RIVER TROUTING 



eyesight is not of the best, find this a great source of 

 trouble. Let them grease the reel line well before a 

 start is made. It will then float, and any check upon 

 it will be noticed immediately. If even that does 

 not get over the difficulty, let them tie on a small 

 piece of light-coloured wool where the cast and line 

 join (the wool can often be obtained from the fences 

 at the stream side where sheep have rubbed), form 

 the wool into a tiny ball and soak it with oil such as is 

 carried by the dry-fly man. When this ball gets 

 water-logged all that is necessary is to squeeze it 

 between finger and thumb and occasionally re-oil it. 

 It will be found to float splendidly, and by following 

 the golfer's first maxim, " Keep your eye on the 

 ball," few bites will pass unobserved. 



Let it be hoped that those who have read to the end 

 of this chapter and feel any inclination to give clear- 

 water worming a trial will get from that branch of the 

 sport as much pleasure and satisfaction as the writers 

 have enjoyed, during those days in summer which 

 come, alas, all too seldom. Days which open with the 

 incomparable freshness of a June morning, continue 

 with the brightest of skies, with songs of birds, and 

 murmuring streams, and close with the landscape 

 wrapped in shadows. The while great beetles drone by, 

 and moths, white and brown, flutter out of the grasses 

 under foot, when it requires an effort to leave such a 

 wonderful world, and to re-enter the dwellings of man. 



