46 rLY FISHING. 



heraldry they are all the better, for iiot being too close a copy of 

 nature. Yet though I differ in this respect, and I consider too 

 great pains cannot be bestowed in making the imitation as like the 

 original as possible, I am compelled to admit that I have seen 

 great execution done with flies, that no fish possessing any power 

 of discrimination could have mistaken for the insects they were 

 named after. This I recollect once occurring in a very remark- 

 able manner when fishing in company with an angling acquaint- 

 ance a few miles below Winchester, when I was surprized to find 

 that my companion, no mean proficient in the art, had only pro- 

 vided himself with a few small flies, with wings of starling's 

 feathers laying very close with the body, which was rather slen- 

 der, and composed of wool of every shade of yellow ; from a deep 

 orange to a pale straw colour. These he called cow dung flies, 

 but he might have called them any thing else with equal propriety 

 for any resemblance they bore to that insect, or in fact any other 

 that ever I saw ; but I soon found the trout took them for some- 

 thing or other that they liked exceedingly, giving them a marked 

 preference to any thing I could offer to their notice, and, though I 

 tried several flies of high killing reputation, not a fish did I slay 

 by their means, till at last my companion, in very compassion, 

 furnished me with a few of the flies I had before thought so lightly 

 of, and then I managed to come in for my share of the day's sport. 

 I also recollect, when a boy, and long before I was an adept in 

 trimming my own flies, on two occasions falling in with wonderful 

 luck with flies of my own fabrication. In the first instance the fly 

 I made was composed of the slate coloured feathers of a pigeon's 

 tail or wing, I do not precisely remember which ; some of the 

 herls being wound round for the body, and some tied on at the 

 head with the intention of resembling wings ; and this, though as 

 clumsy a looking affair as can be well imagined, found such favour 

 in the eyes of the fishes, that they rose and laid hold of it in a 

 most wonderful manner, notwithstanding the place I was fishing 

 in was much disturbed by several other persons who were flogging 

 the water around me ; but not a fish could they raise to any pur- 

 pose with any fly they used, whilst I, in the midst of them, com- 

 pletely filled my bag (for in those days I carried a bag) before 

 I was compelled to leave off in consequence of my fly being tho- 

 roughly worn out in the service, though the fish continued to rise 

 at it long after the body and wings were torn and mingled together 



