i 4 4 FLY FISHING 



is easier to argue in favour of the up stream 

 method, and if two men of equal ability held 

 briefs one on each side, and argued the case 

 against each other before a jury who were 

 without experience of either method, and there- 

 fore presumably impartial, the verdict would 

 probably be given for fishing up stream. But 

 controversy is not always the best method of 

 deciding what is the truth, and in most matters 

 connected with angling, partizanship leads to 

 error, just as certainly as in other affairs. There 

 is no fixed rule to be given in this question 

 of whether to fish up or down. Every angler 

 had better acquire both methods, and be guided 

 by his own experience in the use he makes of 

 them. If, like Mr. Stewart, the great advocate 

 of fishing up stream, he discards the other 

 method altogether, and will not yield even to 

 a rough wind down stream, but prefers to 

 contend with it and maintain his theory in its 

 teeth for hours, by all means let him do so; 

 but it will be better that his persistence and con- 

 fidence should be the result of experience rather 

 than the result of argument or reading. He will 

 at any rate have the satisfaction of having chosen 



