CASTS AT RANDOM 175 



arc, in general, in every stream three characteristic 

 localities wherein at some time the trout will rise to a 

 fly; these are the riffles, rapids, and pools. In each of 

 these places the rises, as a rule, will show certain fairly 

 well sustained differences; that is, to take the con- 

 ditional extremes, the trout of the quiet water will rise 

 to the fly quite differently from his brother of the rapids. 



Dependent upon the time, early, well along, or late 

 in the season, trout are found on the riffles in lesser or 

 greater numbers and at night large trout resort there 

 when feeding. But as a rule the trout of the shallow 

 riffles are not large. They strike very quickly, fre- 

 quently miss, and fastening them is a matter of quick 

 eye and good judgment, to say nothing of an educated 

 wrist. In the pools the conditions are reversed. Here 

 the fish are apt to be weighty and their method of rising 

 and taking the fly is in dignified keeping with their size. 

 The angler must adapt his course of action to the 

 occasion. Also the question of what fly and how fished 

 can usually be decided only by actual trial. 



In regard to the construction of the artificial fly some 

 fly-fishing theorists hold that coloration is of chief im- 

 portance and others maintain that color should be sub- 

 servient to form. The practical fly-fisherman is unwill- 

 ing to subscribe entirely to either theory. Minute dif- 

 ferences and gradations in coloration or form do not 

 appeal to the practical man as being of sufficient im- 

 portance to warrant the hair-splitting and ink-shedding 

 in which their advocates indulge. And yet it must be 

 admitted that almost every angler can cite from his 

 own experience an occasion when some such slight 



