44 THE SCOTTISH ANGLER. 



your nicest ingenuity. There is, however, no proper 

 help for it, although we have observed that a change 

 in the size or colour of the hook will sometimes work 

 wonders ; also, when trouting, a small, white, flesh 

 maggot, toughened in bran, and attached to your fly, 

 is no bad remedy. The fine perception which trout 

 possess in their smell often causes them to quit your 

 artificial insect when just on the point of seizing it. 

 This faculty of theirs is so powerful as to enable them 

 to discern the approach of a worm some yards off, al- 

 though prevented from seizing it by the interposition 

 of a stone or other obstacle. If you throw a handful 

 of salmon roe into a calm clear pool, which seems for 

 the time almost evacuated, except by a few stragglers, 

 and watch it cautiously, you will be surprised at the 

 number of fish smelling their way from all quarters to 

 the baited spot ; many of these will swim up from the 

 distance of two or three hundred yards, directed merely 

 by the flavour carried down to them ; the smallness of 

 which may be imagined more easily than calculated. 



In general, however, trout trust more to their sight, 

 in seizing flies, than to their sense of smell. They 

 dart at them with a velocity too great to be easily 

 checked by any sudden discovery. Like men, they 

 find the deceit when there is no remedy, and gain the 

 most valuable lesson at the precious cost of life. We 

 have even caught trout in very turbid water, angling 

 with the artificial fly in the manner of worm, so fool- 

 ishly are they sometimes taken with appearances. 

 Maggots on a smallish fly are found to be very success- 

 ful during the summer months on many waters. Large 

 trout, however, are careless about seizing them, and will 

 not be seduced by so trifling a tit-bit from any distance. 

 Still, when on the feed, a well- sized fish will rarely 

 refuse the delicately offered lure. Besides the flesh 



