148 FLY FISHING AND SPINNING 



should any danger exist immediately at the back of the 

 fisherman. 



Natural dangers such as trees, bushes, cliffs, etc., and 

 artificial difficulties, such as telegraph-poles, barbed wire, 

 etc., will prevent at times not only the overhead backward 

 cast from being made, but also many other variations of the 

 curved cast. Yet there will always be one variation at least 

 which can be adopted in order to bring the line sufficiently 

 back to be easily and accurately cast forward. The more 

 completely the line can be thus brought back, the better the 

 result in the forward cast. There is no place from which a 

 fisherman cannot cast his line so long as he can bring his 

 rod to its usual backward angle (see Plate XXV.), and so 

 that, between his rod and the object, a clear plane is open 

 for the line in its forward movement. 



The methods of casting with a two-handed rod are 

 identical with those used when casting with a single-handed 

 one, the difference between the two rods being that, instead 

 of the elbow acting as the pivot of the backward and for- 

 ward cast as in the single-handed rod, the pivot of the 

 double-handed rod is situated at a point midway between 

 the two hands, and so long as these pivotal points are 

 respectively maintained, the upward and backward and the 

 forward and downward motions of the upper hand, 

 and the pivot of the double-handed rod, are respectively 

 similar to the same motion of the hand and the elbow with 

 the single-handed rod (see Diagrams 8, 13, 17). 



THE Two PRINCIPLES OF CASTING 



By the term " cast " or " casting," I include all the 

 movements made by a single or double-handed rod in lifting 

 a fly from any one place, and casting it first, either back 

 to the same place, or secondly, to any other desired 

 position on the water. 



