PRACTICAL FLY FISHING 



THE SAND GNAT OR GRAVEL FLY. 



A man may have with him ten thousand good 

 flies, ready dressed, on a good fishing day too, 

 and not meet with much sport. 



In the course of many years' fly-fishing, it 

 had not been my fortune to meet with the Sand 

 Gnat, though I had frequently heard it extolled 

 by my seniors : my angling had been much 

 confined to limestone waters, where it does not 

 appear. 



It was a fine gray morning, early in June, 

 somewhere about 1825, when I set out in com- 

 pany with a friend from Coldstream, to have a 

 day's fly-fishing in the Bowmont, one of these 

 well-stocked little Trout rivers which rise in the 

 Cheviots, and find their way, by the Till, into 

 the Tweed. We began to fish about eleven 

 o'clock, and as the Trout were feeding pretty 

 steadily, we got on tolerably till about one, 

 when we came to an abrupt turn of the river, 

 with a fine large deep dub ; which was quite 

 alive with fish. The flies with which I had 

 previously been having fair diversion the 

 Grouse, the Spring Dun, and the Ruddy, were 

 no longer of any use. I was quite disconcerted, 

 till looking at the sandy gravel in which I stood, 

 I exclaimed, ' It is the Sand Gnat.' There they 

 were by scores, under and about my feet, and 

 a gleam of sun and a light breeze had sent 

 them upon the water. I sat down on the gravel 

 and caught one, and made two imitations, one 

 at each end of a piece of gut. Hook i ; body, 



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