FLF FISHING FOR GRAYLING. 231 



rise often at nothing visible to ordinary eyes, 

 and are occasionally hooked foul in the back 

 fin while doing so. 



The only way with such fish is to persist; as 

 well as keep on using smaller flies, until one 

 gets down to the tiniest black spider on which 

 I remember catching a fine grayling (2 Ibs. 

 i oz.) that had given me many walks back into 

 the meadow to disentangle previous patterns. 

 Two flies I have been especially lucky with 

 are the orange-tag and the ruby-wickham : 

 the one in deepish water and the other in 

 shallows immediately above a run or stickle. 

 The latter is so easily drowned owing to its 

 tinsel sheath and its sparse dressing, that it 

 needs to be well oiled, and kept for a very 

 short time on the surface. Indeed half its 

 efficacy appears to depend upon its 

 impressionism. 



Another hint I remember giving myself was 

 ' dark flies in the morning, light flies in the 

 afternoon.' But no one can be dogmatic who 

 has fished for grayling long; and it may well 

 be that some angler's diary contains the same 

 formula with the two adjectives transposed. We 

 are all inclined to form hasty rules from a 

 particular run of luck at fishing as at whist. 



A tiny red ant with semi invisible split wings 

 a Halford pattern fly bought at the Civil 

 Service Stores once effected a remarkable 

 change upon a whole shallow full of medium 

 sized grayling that I and a few others had 

 thrown over until we were all tired. Sitting 



