THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 265 



Piscator. I thank you, sir, for that kind expression. And, 

 now, let me look out my things to make this fly. 



CHAPTER VI. 



FISHING AT THE TOP CONTINUED. FARTHER DIRECTIONS FOR 

 FLY MAKING. TIME WHEN THE GRAYLING IS IN SEASON. 

 ROCK IN PIKE POOL. 



Piscator, junior. BOY ! come, give me my dubbing bag here 

 presently ; and now, sir, since I find you so honest a man, I 

 will make no scruple to lay open my treasure before you. 



Viator. Did ever any one see the like ! what a heap of 

 trumpery is here ! certainly never an angler in Europe has his 

 shop half so well furnished as you have. 



Piscator. You, perhaps, may think now, that I rake together 

 this trumpery, as you call it, for show only, to the end that 

 such as see it (which are not many, I assure you,) may think 

 me a great master in the art of angling : but let me tell you, 

 here are colours, as contemptible as they seem here, that are 

 very hard to be got, and scarce any one of them which, if it 

 should be lost, I should not miss, and be concerned about the 

 loss of it too, once in the year. But, look you, sir, amongst 

 all these I will choose out these two colours only ; of which, 

 this is bear's hair ;, this darker, no great matter what, but I am 

 sure I have killed a great deal of fish with it ; and with one or 

 both of these, you shall take Trout or Grayling this very day, 

 notwithstanding all disadvantages, or my art shall fail me. 



Viator. You promise comfortably, and I have a great deal of 

 reason to believe every thing you say : but I wish the fly were 

 made, that we were at it. 



Piscator. That will not be long in doing : and pray observe 

 then. You see, first, how I hold my hook ; and thus I begin. 

 Look you, here are my first two or three whips about the bare 

 hook ; thus I join hook and line ; thus I put on my wings ; 

 thus I twirl and lap on my dubbing ; thus I work it up towards 

 the head ; thus I part my wings ; thus I nip my superfluous 

 dubbing from my silk ; thus fasten ; thus trim and adjust my 

 fly. And there 's a fly made : and now, how do you like it ? 



Viator. In earnest, admirably well ; and it perfectly resembles 

 a fly ; * but we about London make the bodies of our flies both 



* If so, it is more than ever I saw any artificial angler's fly do, which, 

 to use Shakespeare's term, imitate Nature abominably ; but though 

 noways like natural flies, (and this is not, it would appear, of the slightest 

 importance,) they certainly catch fish as if they were. J. R. 



