FLIES, FLY-DRESSING, ETC. 89 



fessional dressers, who will make them to any pattern; 

 but anglers should see that they are dressed to 

 pattern. Since the first edition was published, our 

 friends have shown us flies which they bought as being 

 the kind we recommended, and as being tied on fine 

 gut, but which were the identical bushy flies which 

 we have devoted so many pages to warn anglers 

 against ; and as for the gut, it was so thick and 

 coarse as to preclude the possibility of success in 

 anything like fine fishing. All the knowledge of the 

 habits of the trout, all the skill, all the energy, 

 possessed by the most accomplished angler, are merely 

 thrown away in the use of such tackle ; no angler, not 

 even James Baillie, could fill even a small basket in 

 clear water with such tackle. We have given illustra- 

 tions for the very purpose that anglers may compare 

 their flies with them, but it is impossible that fishing- 

 tackle makers can take the care necessary to make 

 proper flies, dress them on the finest gut, and sell 

 them at the present price. 



Several flies are always used together, and the 

 method of joining them, or, as it is usually called, 

 making up the fly-cast, is a point of some importance. 

 The two things most necessary are neatness and firm- 

 ness. We have before mentioned that the gut on 

 which the flies are dressed should be the very finest, 

 and it is equally necessary that the threads used to 

 connect them be of the same description. The 

 following illustration will assist us in explaining to 

 the reader the proper mode of making up a fly-cast. 



The thread of gut on which the tail-fly is dressed 



