THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 269 



it about the armed hook backward, till you come to the 

 setting on of the wings, and then take the feather for the 

 wings, and divide it equally into two parts, and turn them 

 back towards the bend of the hook, the one on the one side 

 and the other on the other of the shank, holding them fast 

 in that posture betwixt the fore-finger and thumb of your 

 left hand ; which done, warp them so down as to stand and 

 slope towards the bend of the hook ; and having warped up 

 to the end of the shank, hold the fly fast betwixt the finger 

 and thumb of your left hand, and then take the silk betwixt 

 the finger and thumb of your right hand, and where the 

 warping ends, pinch or nip it with your thumb-nail against 

 your finger, and strip away the remainder of your dubbing 

 from the silk, and then with the bare silk whip it once or 

 twice about, make the wings to stand in due order, fasten, 

 and cut it off; after which, with the point of a needle, raise 

 up the dubbing gently from the warp, twitch off the super- 

 fluous hairs of your dubbing ; leave the wings of an equal 

 length, your fly will never else swim true, and the work is 

 done. And this way of making a fly, which is certainly the 

 best of all other, was taught me by a kinsman of mine, one 

 Captain Henry Jackson, a near neighbour, an admirable fly- 

 angler, by many degrees the best fly-maker that ever I yet 

 met with.* And now that I have told you how a fly is to 

 be made, you shall presently see me make one, with which 

 you may peradventure take a trout this morning, notwith- 

 standing the unlikeliness of the day ; for it is now nine of 

 the clock, and fish will begin to rise, if they will rise to-day : 

 I will walk along by you, and look on, and after dinner I 

 will proceed in my lecture of fly-fishing. 



VIAT. I confess I long to be at the river, and yet I could 

 sit here all day to hear you : but some of the one, and some 

 of the other, will do well ; and I have a mighty ambition to 

 take a trout in your river Dove. 



Pise. I warrant you shall : I would not for more than I 



* There needs nothing more be said of these directions, than that hundreds 

 have, by means of them alone, become excellent fly-makers. H. 



[NOTE.- I cannot agree with Sir J. Hawkins. Cotton's directions are 

 limited to making the easiest of all made flies a fly with body and wings, but 

 without tail, hackle-feather for legs, tinsel for tip and ribbing. In consequence, 

 I have given diagrams of the artificial fly in its several stages of fabrication, 

 and have elucidated them with written descriptions and instructions. See the 

 last pages of this work. ED.] 



