12 ANGLING. 



necessary to an angler, about the necessity of 

 changing his tackle according to each particular 

 month throughout the season, about one fly being 

 adapted solely to the morning, another to noonday, 

 and a third to the evening, and about every river 

 having its own particular flies, &c., is, if not al- 

 together erroneous, at least greatly exaggerated and 

 misconceived. That determinate relations exist 

 between flies of a certain colour and particular con- 

 ditions of a river, is, we doubt not, true ; but these 

 are rather connected with angling as an artificial 

 science, and have but little to do with any analogous 

 relations in nature. The great object, by whatever 

 means to be accomplished, is to render the fly de- 

 ceptive ; and this, from the very nature of things, 

 is continually effected by fishing with flies which 

 differ in colour and appearance from those which 

 prevail upon the water; because in truth, as we 

 shall afterwards have occasion to shew, none else 

 can be purchased or procured. Even admitting, 

 for a moment, the theory of representation, when 

 a particular fly prevails upon a river, an artificial 

 one, in imitation of it, will never resemble it so 

 closely as to appear the same to those below (i. e. 

 the fish) : on the contrary, a certain degree of re- 

 semblance, without any thing like an exact simili- 

 tude, will only render the finny tribe the more 

 cautious through suspicion ; while a different shape 

 and colour, by exciting no minute or invidious 

 comparisons, might probably be swallowed without 

 examination. Indeed, it seems sufficiently plain, 

 that where means of comparison are allowed, and 



