2 Fly Fishing for Salmon. 



fly fishing was intricate and impracticable." Frank 

 wrQtVBs riienloirs in 1658, and dedicates his book 

 .to >j*S' brothel anglers : " The rest of the Fraternity 

 ■0^' the' kod, that ramble the margin of famous 

 Thames, Trent, Severn, &c/' But he says nothing 

 of the Thames as a salmon river for yielding sport 

 to a fly fisher. These fish, however, must have 

 frequented the river in large numbers. 



Thomas Faulkner ("Historical and Topogra- 

 phical Description of Chelsea," 1829), says, "It 

 appears, by authentic documents, that in the 

 reign of Charles II., the fishery was carried on here 

 to a very considerable extent by Charles Cheyne, 

 Esq., the lord of the manor, and others ; but, owing 

 to the evil practices of the fishermen, in using un- 

 lawful nets, and from other causes, it fell into 

 decay, and finally proved an unprofitable specula- 

 tion. The right of fishery extended from Battersea 

 to Lambeth. About the year 1664, Sir Walter 

 St. John resigned all his rights to the Rooms of the 

 Salmon Fishery within the River Thames, to the 

 fishermen of Chelsea, between Upper Lindsay Place 

 above the Feathers towards the west, to the creek 

 called York Place Creek on the east, with free liberty 

 to cast and draw up their nets upon part of the 

 waste adjoining, and also to the depasture, and 

 liberty to feed one horse upon the waste for drawing 

 up their fishing boats; and, in the same year, a 



