ON MATERIALS AND IMPLEMENTS 



both as to their natural gloss and transparency, as 

 well as the greater ease -with which they are freed 

 from moisture in fishing, that, excepting in the 

 case of honey duns and other very rare colours, I 

 have practically discarded all hen hackles from 

 my collection. It must be noted that hackles 

 should be taken from a cock of eighteen months to 

 two years old, and the best time of the year to take 

 them is about Christmas. An exception to this 

 rule should be made in the case of dun hackles, 

 which are blue or grizzled at Christmas, but before 

 the autumn moult have golden or sunburnt points, 

 though a trifle more ragged in the fibre. Common 

 barndoor fowls seldom produce such hackles as 

 would please the critical eye of the connoisseur, 

 and when it is remembered how few in number 

 on any bird are sufficiently small to dress duns, 

 some idea may be formed of the almost insuper- 

 able difficulty of accumulating a really serviceable 

 stock : in fact, it is almost impossible to get cock 

 hackles really fit for fly-making purposes, except 

 by purchasing them at considerable cost from 

 professional breeders, or from the fishing-tackle 

 makers. I can only make one suggestion on the 

 subject to amateur fly-dressers, resident in the 

 metropolis, who do not care to pay the fancy 

 prices asked in the shops, and that is to try and 

 induce some of their country cousins to keep and 

 breed fowls of the kind required, especially for the 

 production of dun hackles. I have succeeded in 



