454 MANUAL FOR YOUNG SPORTSMEN. 



stream or down, but he will soon find out by experience 

 that the wind in his back is advantageous to him, and that 

 he will scarcely succeed in any case in casting his fly in 

 the face of a strong breeze. Beyond this, no rule will in 

 all cases apply, and the fly-fisher must use his own discre- 

 tion, founded in great measure upon practical observation, 

 as to the precise mode in which he will reach and fish 

 particular parts of the water that he believes to be the 

 resort of good trout. Indeed, it is useless to attempt 

 instructing the tyro by theoretical lessons in the details of 

 an art in which it is certain that nothing but practice can 

 give any degree of proficiency. This is constantly shown 

 even in the professed fly-fisher of two or three seasons' ex- 

 perience, who throws his fly with all the most approved 

 motions, and is beforehand fully convinced that he is 

 the equal of any angler, from Maine to Mississippi; 

 but, when he sees fish after fish hooked and landed 

 by some older hand following in his wake, and using the 

 very same fly, with perhaps an inferior rod, he is obliged 

 to confess that theory must succumb to delicacy of hand- 

 ling, and that fly-fishing is a practical art, rather than a 

 science attainable in the closet. The various degrees of 

 success mark the difference between the master and the 

 scholar, and show that a lifetime may be spent in acquir- 

 ing the power of deceiving this wary fish, and yet there 

 may be room for improvement ; hence it is that so many 

 men of talent have been devotees to the fly-rod, and while 

 they have enjoyed the beauties of nature displayed to 

 them during the prosecution of their sport, they have 

 nevertheless been much more deeply engaged in acquiring 



