36 APPROACHING THE WATER. 



The spell is broken, you must try above the 

 bridge, and remember to again execute a prudent 

 approach by keeping back in the field among 

 the sheep and coming up to the bank behind 

 the next high tuft of grass. 



Once in situ keep quiet again. Within easy 

 casting distance are perhaps half-a-dozen trout, 

 mostly over ten ounces, any three of which you 

 may pick out within the next half-hour. Does 

 half-an-hour seem a long time ? It may ; but 

 do not forget the last occasion when you fished 

 that meadow a year ago when you pressed on 

 and on right up the quarter-mile stretch, and 

 got nothing before the evening rise. As it is, 

 if two or three goodish fish are basketed before 

 8.30 you will have done creditably. You may 

 get more; you may even get into a pounder at 

 the extreme top of the next stickle by throwing 

 far over the eddy into the circling backwater the 

 other side where the bushes overhang. Don't 

 stand up, and don't hurry. To an angler 

 accustomed to fish in coloured water all this 

 sounds poor fun, slavery, but under the con- 

 ditions cited it is the only way to catch trout, 

 and sooner or later you like myself will find 

 it so. 



As regards learning to approach the water 

 well it is an advantage to begin one's education 

 in June rather than in March or April. For 

 all future pleasure it will scarcely be denied that 

 it is best to learn to play the game, and 

 practise upstream fishing, with wet or dry fly, 

 rather than merely adopt the vocation of a creel 



