38 THE DRY FLY AND FAST WATER 



The study of the positions taken by big fish 

 when they are feeding, and those which they 

 occupy when they are not, is an important part 

 of the education of the fly fisher. Each time 

 the angler takes a good fish or sees one feeding, 

 if he will note in his diary its position, the con- 

 dition of the water, temperature, atmosphere, 

 time of day, and the insect being taken, he 

 will soon have an accumulation of data from 

 which he may learn how to plan a campaign 

 against particular fish at other times. Ex- 

 tremely interesting in itself, the study of insects 

 is of great value to the angler in his attempts 

 at imitation, and the information gleaned from 

 autopsy might not be acquired in any other 

 manner. 



It may be said to be an axiom of the fly fisher 

 that where a small trout is seen feeding rarely 

 need a large one be looked for. But the actions 

 of a small fish in sight may sometimes indicate 

 the presence of a larger one unseen. The tak- 

 ing of a fine trout on a certain stream in Sulli- 

 van County, on August 27, 1906, after one of 

 those long periods of drought so common in 

 recent years, convinced me of this. I had been 

 waiting for even a slight fall of rain, and, quite 

 a heavy shower having come up the evening 



