332 A BOOK ON ANGLING 



four loops double it, leaving one end somewhat longer than 

 the other, bite the gut that is to be lashed to the shank well up 

 and down between the teeth to ensure its not drawing ; then 

 lay it to the hook, and with a fine strong double thread of 

 glover's silk, or any other silk that is fine and strong, well 

 waxed, begin at the head or shoulder and lash it firmly on, 

 leaving a gut loop as in Plate XXII, Fig. 2. And here 

 I may pause to say, always get the best, newest, finest, 

 and strongest silk you can buy for money. It is not always 

 easy to obtain. Old silk is pretty sure to get rotten, and rotten 

 silk is an abomination. It always fails you when it should not 

 just as you are tying in or tying off a hackle, and want to 

 make an unusually strong and tight hitch. You must have two 

 or three colours ; the lighter ones are best, white best of all, 

 yellow next, and then red ; avoid green or black, as those dyes 

 rot the silk, green especially* 



Having tied in your loop, leaving a good long end of silk 

 hanging down, proceed to business ; and here, again, I must 

 pause to bid you observe that you do not commence to tie the 

 gut on quite up to the end of the hook, as observe in the cut. 

 If you do, you make an unsafe and clumsy shoulder to the fly. 

 Now put your hook in the vice, if you use one, as most ama- 

 teurs do. The young tyer particularly will want all his fingers 

 about the fly, and will not find it at all easy to hold the hook 

 and tie too. He may possibly come to it in time, but at first he 

 will find his vice a great convenience ; and if he be a wealthy 

 man, and can afford to buy one of those splendid vices of 

 Holtzappfel's, in Cockspur Street, which cost some three 

 or four pounds, and by which the hook can be twisted about 

 in any direction, no doubt he will realise the convenience of the 

 same. 



Having fixed his hook firmly, he must, by the aid of the 

 loose silk hanging from the bend of the hook, tie on the tag, 

 which is usually a bit of tinsel. Let him make a long turn of 

 the silk first over the end of the tinsel, as far down towards the 

 bend of the hook as he wishes to go, then lap round lightly back 

 towards the head of the fly, so as not to have to go over the same 

 ground with the silk twice, and, having fixed the end firmly 

 and taken a half hitch (see Plate XXII, Fig. 2), twist the tinsel 

 two or three times round the hook, so that each turn shall be 

 evenly side by side. Tie the remainder of the tinsel off firmly 

 with a couple of turns and a half hitch, and cut off the 

 fragment, but not too closely to the silk, or it may happen to 



