A Dry-Fly Purist's Advice to a Beginner. 47 



specified in the foregoing pages), including creel 

 and shoulder-strap, only weigh 3flb. And, while 

 fishing, the three boxes of flies and casts can easily 

 be transferred to one's pockets, leaving the creel free 

 for luncheon packages. Nor need the creel always 

 be carried ; it can from time to time be hung on a 

 bough, and thus the burden be reduced by more 

 than half. In fuller elucidation of easing the 

 burden of a fly fisherman, the following article was 

 published in the Field : 



A LIGHT DRY-FLY EQUIPMENT. 



After reading in a recent number of the Field an 

 article describing a dry-fly man's burden, almost too 

 much to bear, I am moved to show by the following 

 account of my own methods (long since evolved 

 from much experience, and, it may be said, proved 

 advantageous in successful practice) how any 

 excessive weight to be carried by a dry-fly purist may 

 be avoided. First, then, as to the artificial flies : 

 I do not myself require any for wet-fly fishing, as I 

 never resort to it, even in a half-tempting emer- 

 gency, when no fish are rising to take surface food 

 for many hours, and yet in sharp runs or other 

 likely places they can be seen minnowing, or 

 picking larvae from the weed-beds or river gravel, 

 haply intercepting nymphse. Nor are flies on much 

 larger-eyed hooks than No. 2 required for sedge-fly 



