382 THE SALMON FLY. 



and very different in colour and type. Two casts with each fly are 

 sufficient, provided the water is not discoloured. In giving the fourth trial 

 having rested the catch for ten minutes, put on a Grub, one or two sizes 

 larger, or the fly that first raised the fish. And before finally giving in, 

 try a fly in character with the river both in colour and make, three or four 

 sizes larger than any one previously presented. 



If, however, you have an " interview " with a Salmon i.e., prick him, 

 it is not worth while trying again. Only once in my career have 

 I succeeded after an " interview," and then the fish had shifted its quarters. 

 A Salmon at the bottom of a pool on the Wester Elchies water had run 

 me foul, broken the line, and taken away fly and gut length. On resuming 

 operations at the head of the pool, I found to my astonishment after 

 gaffing a fish, the very fly in his mouth I had just lost below. Shortly 

 after this capture, on working my way down the pool again, I lost, for the 

 second time, the self-same fly in the same place and way as before. 



How well I remember the joyous chaff of that eventful evening ! 



But is there not very often a reason for merely pricking fish ? I 

 think so, and have many a time traced it to some fault of the fly. The 

 pattern, for instance, may be overdressed as regards the actual amount of 

 materials ; your conspicuous feathers, Jungle, Summer Duck and the like, 

 too large ; your long hackled fly too much played ; or your pattern too 

 lar^e, too gaudy, or altogether too fanciful. Under any such circum- 

 stances, it should be changed for something quieter in tone, smaller in 

 size, different perhaps in type, and not played at all. Eeverse the whole 

 process in fact. 



After fishing the eddy you pass on to the catches below it ; the first 

 of which we will suppose is created by a boulder causing the current to 

 flow from it on both its exposed sides, and making the water " sail back " 

 in its immediate wake. This wake perhaps increases in width until the 

 waters join again. Salmon will not lie behind an obstruction of this sort, 

 but take up their quarters on either side just on the verge of the down- 

 ward current. 



"Ah ! there he is, sir," says the gillie, betraying no emotion moving 

 not a muscle of his wiry frame. " See that ' heads and tails ' no splash, 

 no noise, a sure taker he is. But I say, sir, look at this nasty, drowsy 



