136 THE DRY FLY AND FAST WATER 



From Williamson's time no work on fly fish- 

 ing seemed complete unless instructions were 

 given in the art of fly making, with a description 

 of the sorts and colours of furs, silks, feathers, 

 etc., suitable for the imitation of the natural 

 insects held to be so necessary; but until the 

 appearance in 1836 of Ronalds's "Fly Fishers' 

 Entomology," it cannot be said of any author 

 that the instructions given by him were the re- 

 sult of scientific study. Ronalds was most 

 thorough in his investigation, and his experi- 

 ments in regard to the senses of taste and hear- 

 ing of trout are extremely interesting and in- 

 structive. While his conclusions run counter to 

 the opinions of many other angling writers, to 

 my mind they appear logical and are con- 

 vincing; and I think he proves that trout do 

 not have the senses of taste and hearing de- 

 veloped to the degree of acuteness attributed to 

 them by other writers. Following some advice 

 as to the choice of flies, Ronalds says: "It should 

 never be forgotten that, let the state of weather 

 or the water be what it may, success in fly 

 fishing very much depends upon showing the 

 fish a good imitation, both in colour and size, 

 of that insect which he has recently taken; an 

 exact resemblance of the shape does not seem to 



