8 THE SALMON FLY. 



which I no longer fish, sometimes for any score at all when low, vapid 

 water and bright sun have given full scope for testing every kind of theory. 



Punch has depicted some theorist baffled to the verge of desperation, 

 finally throwing his collection of flies, book and all, into the " Catch." 

 Then there is the numerous school of sportsmen, whose guiding doctrine 

 is, " Some days, you know, you can't keep fish off the hook, and some 

 days they won't look at the best fly in your book or anybody else's." 

 A dummy clock-face with painted hands is periodically right twice in 

 twenty-four hours ; and such people have the solace of occasional success, 

 though its recurrence is generally at long intervals. It is true that, at 

 times, nothing avails to tempt fish, but then these barren times are very 

 much fewer for the systematic Fisherman than for the novice ; were it 

 otherwise, there would be no raison d'etre for this book. In short, I hold 

 that the advantages of the " systematic " Angler are surprisingly pro- 

 nounced. Even a few good working principles are needful to justify any 

 assurance of success. 



The ability to " dress " a fly, even fairly well, enhances the pleasure 

 of Salmon fishing to a degree truly inconceivable to the uninitiated. 

 " Fly-dressing," in itself a pleasant art, is an accomplishment that must 

 very often contribute to sport otherwise unattainable ; and there are 

 many occasions when it proves to be the actual determining condition of 

 any sport at all, for it is no uncommon experience that a fish which has 

 refused a boxful of " likelies " has, in the 'end been lured to his doom 

 by a fly hastily dressed at the river's side to meet the exigencies of the 

 moment. Somewhere or other, I forget where, I have read an ill- 

 founded but unimportant sneer at the possibility of doing such a thing ; 

 but I have myself succeeded in this way many and many a time. It is 

 no exaggeration of w y ords to say that I have dressed hundreds of flies 

 al frcico and with admirable results in their use as an immediate 

 consequence. 



There is no necessity to burden one-self with any great bulk of 

 materials, in order to command a far larger scope in size and in pattern 

 of fly than that afforded by the most corpulent of fly-books. Not 

 unfrequently, be it remembered, a small deduction from, or addition 

 to, a wing turns the scale (and scales) in the Angler's favour. 



