8 RODS. 



makers have the advantage, inasmuch as they can 

 make a stiff rod, but English makers generally 

 fail in their pliable ones. English rods, too, from 

 the difference in wages and rent, are necessarily 

 more expensive than Irish. Rods vary in price, 

 from five shillings for bottom -fishing, to five 

 pounds for salmon-fishing. The worst in my 

 possession cost me the latter amount. Great 

 difference of opinion exists as to the respective 

 merits of the stiff and the limber salmon-rod. I 

 prefer the latter, but, as usual, there is much to 

 be said on both sides. The stiffer the rod, the 

 easier it is to throw with, and the less the chance 

 of whipping off the fly. A stiff rod, too, picks 

 the fly more readily off the water, and, deftly 

 handled, will throw a heavy line in the teeth of 

 a Nor'-wester, " bite he never so rudely." But then 

 it seldom happens that the fisherman is compelled 

 to cast in the teeth of the wind. Streams trout 

 and salmon streams especially turn and wind, and 

 bend and double, and present all manner of faces 

 to the wind. If one pool will not fish, another 

 will ; if one stream run counter, the next will flow 

 fair : a side wind, as in sailing, can always be made 

 serviceable ; indeed it is greatly preferable, to my 

 thinking, for casting, whatever it may be for sailing, 

 to one directly astern. The "gentle art" is not 



