EARLY DAYS 17 



the corner upstream at a venture and trust to luck 

 for the issue. This plan succeeded. I do not 

 know how I became aware that something was 

 withholding my black gnat from me, but I did be- 

 come aware of it, the rod went up, and the half- 

 pounder in due course was mine. After more than 

 twenty years that fish still gives me a thrill of 

 satisfaction. 



In those days I had not yet come to the dry fly 

 so the black gnat was fished wet, but since then I 

 have occasionally had a similar experience with a 

 floating fly. It is, however, much harder to detect 

 a rise round a corner in dry-fly fishing unless you can 

 hear it or catch sight of the advance party of the 

 betraying rings. I do not pin much hope on a 

 round-the-corner attack as a rule. With the wet 

 fly there is more chance. The line is, or should be, 

 fairly taut from the rod-point, which is raised as the 

 fly comes downstream, and when a fish takes the 

 fact may be notified by a check to the line, or 

 possibly by a definite sensation of stoppage which is 

 perceptible to the hand. A very slight thing ought 

 to be perceptible if an angler is on the alert, and 

 though he possibly could not express it more exactly 

 than by saying that " something is different some- 

 how," it has enough effect to make him strike, which 

 is all that is wanted. The sense of touch is much 

 more delicate than most people suppose, and it 



