ON RAPID STREAMS. 9 



precise fly to be selected on any particular day or 

 hour. As to this point of selection of the fancied 

 fly, it appears the common belief that the trout 

 are so extremely dainty in the choice of their 

 viands, that for each particular meal, occurring 

 at regular intervals of the day, they are expectant 

 of, and searching for, some peculiarity in their 

 food; such distinctive discrimination urging them 

 to the necessity of selecting, at one time a fly 

 which a little later in the day would be rejected, 

 basing or at least connecting their views of the 

 trout's choice of flies, with the different varieties 

 of insects at one time or another to be observed 

 in most abundance on the surface of the water, 

 rendering them thereby the more plausible, inas- 

 much as they are set down as being consistent 

 with the natural habits of the trout, which all 

 admit must be carefully studied ere we can expect 

 a mastery over a fish apparently so sly and 

 cunning; well, this view may, nay, I know full 

 well does, apply in some degree to the Art of fly- 

 fishing, or deceiving trout by flies in ponds, or 

 any such deep and still water ; but as a principle 

 to rely upon for success when our endeavours are 

 directed to rapid streams, it is utterly fallacious, 

 and the result of an imaginative theory, rather 

 than the correct deduction from observed facts. 



The trout in the pond, as an extreme example, 

 or in deep sluggish rivers, is a fish whose habits 

 are retiring, whose feeding is at intervals, and to 

 whom rest succeeds a hearty and satisfactory meal; 

 he has little labour to perform, the pond or 



