108 'TWIXT SPUING AND SUMMER 



and channels where the current is always brisk, even in 

 the most prolonged drought; therefore a small double- 

 hooked Black Ranger, on fine but strong gut, directed 

 by a light fifteen-foot rod, is soon swimming where the 

 water flows swift and dark between two precipitous cliffs. 

 Before following it in its fortunes, let me pause to notice 

 two points in the salmon-fisher's equipment about which 

 professional opinion is deeply divided. 



First, as to the aforesaid double hooks. There are men 

 of experience and skill who have given them fair trial, 

 yet have discarded and decry them. They distrust 

 them, alleging that one of the hooks often forces the 

 other from its hold. It is not easy to perceive what 

 evidence could be had to bring them to that understand- 

 ing, but they are quite convinced about it; and the 

 tackle-makers tell me that, except for the Tweed, double- 

 hooked flies are seldom ordered. 



Well, to me this is wholly incomprehensible. It is very 

 many years since I first used double hooks, and as I used 

 to dress all my own flies in those far-off days, I had every 

 reason for prejudice against the novelty, because as every 

 fly-dresser knows, it is much easier to turn out a tasteful 

 article upon a single iron than upon a double one. But 

 I soon became convinced of their merits, and remain so 

 to that degree that I never feel happy in using a single 

 hook of less than an inch and a half in length. Short of 

 that, a double hook of the square Fennel bend anchors 

 itself so securely in the fish's mouth, that in playing him 

 one is absolved from that gnawing anxiety about the 

 single steel cutting its way out, which embitters some of 

 the most exciting passages in the sport. In this season 

 down to the present date (1st June), I have landed thirty- 



