CHAPTER V 



ARTIFICIAL FLY-FISHING 



Varieties of Trout Instructions as to Rods and Tackle How to use them 

 Weather How to choose Flies Dress Night-Fishing, 



THE TROUT (Salmo fario) 



PROBABLY of all the fish that inhabit the fresh 

 waters, there is none which afford so wide-spread 

 and great an amount of sport to the angler as the 

 trout, and this is partly owing to the nature of the 

 fish itself, and partly to the exceedingly wide area of its distri- 

 bution, for it is found in almost all temperate and cold climates. 

 But if the localities in which it is found are various, scarcely less 

 so are the characteristics of the fish itself. Indeed, it is difficult to 

 believe that the strongly marked differences found to exist do not 

 almost constitute separate species. I do not allude to the mere 

 question of size, though that is sufficiently striking at times to 

 raise a doubt as to their identity in the angler's mind ; for who 

 that looks upon the noble Thames trout of fourteen or fifteen 

 pounds weight, in all its panoply of silver, could, when placing 

 it beside the little dark-coloured, smutty-looking troutling of 

 three or four ounces, hooked out from under some overhanging 

 bank in a moss burn, hold that they were brothers of the same 

 family ? But there are often actual differences in their 

 anatomy, in so far as relates to the number of their fin rays 

 and vertebrae. Indeed, in examining two trout from different 

 streams, even though one may be a tributary of the other, not 

 only will a marked difference often be observed, but that 

 difference will hardly ever be found to be absent. This point is 

 one which it is difficult to account for, and we can but speculate 

 upon it. The markings also vary greatly. Some trout are 

 almost without the red spots, others are as distinctly pan- 

 marked as any salmon fry, while their brothers in the same 

 water will be destitute of such markings altogether. In fact, 

 the varieties are endless, for every stream has its particular 



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