Notes and Sport of a Dry -Fly Purist. 123 



gasworks during the latter part of their dinner-hour 

 had been watching behind me, but I was quite 

 unconscious of their presence until they called out : 

 " That is a nice fish, sir," and crowded round to 

 admire it. About three o'clock another chance 

 offered lower down at the first wide bend. Two 

 fish, both within reach of where I knelt, were rising, 

 but only at long intervals probably their feast on 

 fiies was nearly finished and they had become 

 fastidious, for when, at the second throw, my fly 

 covered the nearest one, he quietly sidled off under 

 horse-tail weeds. But the other fish was not so 

 shy, and after casting over him several times he 

 accepted the fateful fly, was hooked in the tongue, 

 and immediately bolting up stream made fast, for 

 an anxious minute, in a weed-bed of water celery, 

 from whence, however, he was drawn forth by 

 taking the line in the left-hand fingers and using 

 gentle but gradually increasing force, while the 

 right hand held the rod sloping backward from the 

 vertical position, ready to play him when released. 

 An excellent plan, but not fully effectual until the 

 unavoidably slack line could be reeled in, the 

 quarry held taut from the bending rod, and 

 drawn gasping into the landing net a well- 

 conditioned fish scaling 21b. 5oz. The brace, 

 weighing 51b. 2oz., was shown to the head-keeper 

 on my way back. There was absolutely not a 



