422 Fly -rods and Fly -tackle. 



especially if they are left to provide for themselves. We 

 all know they are very voracious, and if no limit, except 

 their own inclination, were placed upon the quantity they 

 should eat, that they would stuff themselves like pigs. 

 Many a time has every experienced angler taken trout 

 on the fly which were gorged with other food. I remem- 

 ber once thus taking a half-pound trout in a Connecti- 

 cut stream which was full up to its neck with June bugs. 

 But if they are at times inordinate feeders, they are 

 equally proficient as f asters. Mr. Henry Stanley, one of 

 the Maine Fish Commissioners, once told me the follow- 

 ing case in point. He had carred a number of large 

 trout for breeding purposes in October, when he injured 

 his hand and was forced to go out to the settlements for 

 medical aid. The consequences of the accident and early 

 and heavy snows prevented his return till the following 

 spring, yet he found his captives alive and active, though 

 all the food they could possibly have had, must have 

 been the almost infinitesimal quantity which entered be- 

 tween the slats of the car. True, this was largely dur- 

 ing the winter, when some suppose trout feed but little. 

 Take another case occurring in summer. Some years 

 ago the well-known guide John S. Danforth, to whom I 

 have so frequently alluded, had three or four nice large 

 fish. He was suddenly called away for what he sup- 

 posed would be but a few days. He had taken the trout 

 for a special purpose, and wished to save them for the 

 end in view; so he put them in a small car, and sunk it 

 in about forty feet of water. He was gone some two 

 months, and often those unhappy fish weighed heavily on 

 his mind. On his return his first step was to raise the 

 car. He found them rather " lathy," as he expressed it, but 

 alive and well. Of course they were restored to liberty. 



