296 THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 



Pise. And I, sir, as ready to give you the best I can. 

 Having told you the time of the STONE-FLY'S coming in, and 

 that lie is bred of a cadis in the very river where he is taken, 

 I am next to tell you that, 



13. This same STONE-FLY has not the patience to continue 

 in his crust, or husk, till his wings be full grown ; but so 

 soon as ever they begin to put out, that he feels himself 

 strong, (at which time we call him a jack) squeezes himself 

 out of prison, and crawls to the top of some stone, where, if 

 he can find a chink that will receive him, or can creep be- 

 twixt two stones, the one lying hollow upon the other, which, 

 by the way, we also kiy so purposely to find them, he there 

 lurks till his wings be full grown, and there is your only place 

 to find him, and from thence doubtless he derives his name ; 

 though, for want of such convenience, he will make shift with 

 the hollow of a bank, or any other place where the wind can- 

 not come to fetch him off. His body is long, and pretty thick, 

 and as broad at the tail almost as in the middle ; his colour 

 a very fine brown, ribbed with yellow, and much yellower on 

 the belly than the back ; he has two or three whisks also at 

 the tag of his tail, and two little horns upon his head ; his 

 wings, when full grown, are double, and flat down his back, 

 of the same colour, but rather darker than his body, and 

 longer than it, though he makes but little use of them ; for 

 you shall rarely see him flying, though often swimming and 

 paddling with several feet he has under his belly, upon the 

 water, without stirring a wing : but the Drake will mount 

 steeple-high into the air, though he is to be found among 

 flags and grass, too, and indeed everywhere high and low, 

 near the river ; there being so many of them in their season, 

 as, were they not a very inoffensive insect, would look like a 

 plague ; and these drakes, since I forgot to tell you before, I 

 will tell you here, are taken by the fish to that incredible 

 degree, that, upon a calm day, you shall see the still deeps 

 continually all over circles by the fishes rising, who will gorge 

 themselves with those flies, till they purge again out of their 

 gills ; and the trouts are at that time so lusty and strong, that 

 one of eight or ten inches long, will then more struggle, and 

 tug, and more endanger your tackle, than one twice as big 

 in winter ; but pardon this digression. 



This STONE-FLY then, we dape or dibble with, as with the 

 DHAKE, but with this difference, that whereas the GREEN- 

 DRAKE is common both to stream and still, and to all hours 



