CHAP. VIII. THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 333 



1. To which I shall only add a CAMEL-BROWN fly, 

 the dubbing pulled out of the lime of a wall, whipt about 

 with red silk ; and a darkish grey mallard's feather for 

 the wing. 



2. And one other for which we have no name; but it 

 is made of the black hair of a badger's skin, mixt with the 

 yellow softest down of a sanded hog. 



OCTOBER. 



The same flies are taken this month that were taken in 

 March. 



NOVEMBER. 



The same flies that were taken in February are taken 

 this month also. 



DECEMBER. 



Few men angle with the fly this month, no more than 

 they do in January : but yet, if the weather be warm (as 

 I have known it sometimes in my life to be, even in this 

 cold country, where it is least expected) then a brown, 

 that looks red in the hand, and yellowish betwixt your eye 

 and the sun, will both raise and kill in a clear water and 

 free from snow-broth : but, at the best, it is hardly worth 

 a man's labour. 1 



(1) Some, in making a fly, work it upon anil fasten in immediately to the hook- 

 link, whether it be of gut, grass, or hair : others whip, on the shank of the hook, 

 a stiff hog's bristle bent into a loop : and concerning these methods there are 

 different opinions. 



I confess the latter, except for small flies, seems to me the more eligible way ; 

 and it has this advantage, that it enables you to keep your flies in excellent 

 order; to do which, string them, each species separately, through the loops, 

 upon a fine piece of cat-gut, of about seven inches long; and string also thereon, 

 through a large pin-hole, a very small ticket of parchment, with the name of the 

 fly written on it : tie the cat-gut into a ring ; and lay them in round flat boxes, 

 with paper between each ring. And when you use them, having a neat loop at 

 the lower end of your hook-link, you may put them on and take them off at 

 pleasure. 



In the other way, you are troubled with a great length of hook-link, which, if 

 you put even but few flies together, is sure to tangle, and occasion great trouble 

 and loss of time. And as to an objection which some make to a loop, that the fish 

 set it, and therefore will not take the fly, you may be assured there is nothing in it. 



