iv. PREFACE 



efficacy of written instructions on this delightful science, 

 but the author cannot too strongly deprecate the 

 assumption that this book is written with the view of 

 attempting to teach experienced fishermen. It is written 

 especially for those who are thinking of taking up the sport, 

 and if the author should be successful in imparting to these 

 the skill which has afforded him so many happy hours, 

 and if, in addition, some of his ideas and methods may 

 happen to interest his brother fishermen, he will, in some 

 measure, repay the debt which he owes to a kindly Provi- 

 dence for giving him so many delightful opportunities of 

 fishing. 



No kill is quite equal to that of the first salmon ; no 

 thrill can exceed that which runs from the fisherman's 

 hands to his brain as he braces his muscles to resist the first 

 rush of a fresh-run salmon, feels the long downward strain 

 on his rod, and hears the screech of the reel as his first fish 

 plunges down-stream in its initial rush for safety ; no 

 tension is more delightful than the first twenty minutes 

 spent with a clean-run salmon ; and no satisfaction, so far 

 as the sport is concerned, can possibly exceed that felt by 

 him as the gleaming silver sides of his first fish emerge 

 from the water securely held on his gillie's gaff. The vigour 

 of the sport, the grandeur of the scenery, and the revivifying 

 atmosphere of his surroundings, offer a tonic to the system 

 far more pleasant and of infinitely greater value than any 

 the pharmacopoeia is capable of producing. The contest 

 between the salmon and the fisherman is more severe, longer, 

 and the result more uncertain than that between the trout 

 and man, and during the time the struggle lasts no fisher- 

 man would deny that salmon is infinitely superior to trout 

 fishing ; but during all the other hours of these two sports 

 dry fly fishing for trout may with justice claim precedence 

 as the most attractive form of angling. 



