66 Fly-rods and Fly-tackle. 



One objection to the tapered line is that it costs more 

 short taper of four or five feet, eight cents a yard ; 

 long taper of eighteen or twenty feet, ten cents ; level, 

 six and a half cents. 



Again, no person of experience casts a longer line 

 than the necessities of the case require. The eighty 

 feet casts of the tournament have little or no place in 

 practical fishing ; and when casting, the line is kept 

 out of the water as much as possible, so that only a few 

 feet of its outer end is constantly wetted. As these 

 lines are practically never taken from the reel to dry, 

 after a greater or less lapse of time the strength of that 

 portion becomes impaired. The expert angler never 

 thinks of inaugurating a new season without carefully 

 testing the strength of this part of his last year's line, 

 breaking it off at the slightest suspicion of weakness, a 

 foot or two at a time, until sound material is reached. 

 Now in the tapered not only does this decay, because of 

 the smaller diameter, reach the danger point much 

 sooner than in the level line, but it extends farther up 

 the line ; and if any part must be sacrificed, it is the 

 tapered portion which must go. The result is that the 

 tapered line, after a couple of seasons, becomes a " level " 

 line, and of a thickness greater than the angler would 

 prefer. Therefore it seems advisable, if economy be 

 any object, to buy a level line of the very best quality, 

 and at least forty yards better fifty of it. Such a 

 line will last for years. About twenty-five yards is the 

 minimum length that a trout fly-line should be, so this 

 gives a good reserve to meet either accident or decay; 

 and it will be long before you are encumbered with that 

 mass of trash which is the angler's bane flies, leaders, 

 and lines, which you dare not use, are ashamed to give 



