X PREFACE. 



fish, it is another and much more difficult thing 

 to do it successfully ; but the theory of angling 

 therein explained has been generally received 

 as correct, and if the angler cannot put it in 

 practice it is his own fault. Most of our 

 readers, however, admit having derived some 

 benefit from these pages, and we have received 

 numerous letters from anglers residing in all 

 parts of the kingdom mentioning this, and 

 stating that their baskets now present a very 

 different appearance on their return from a day's 

 angling. It is, however, painful to be compelled 

 to admit that there is a very large number of 

 anglers who have never read this volume at all, 

 giving as a reason that they know all that is in 

 it already and can fish well enough. Now, if 

 these were first-rate anglers there would be some 

 excuse for them, but they are by no means so, 

 and it would be difficult to understand the state 

 of their minds, but that Blackwood's Magazine 

 has most opportunely solved the problem. The 

 reviewer of this volume in that periodical says 

 " that darkness rather than light is the deliberate 

 choice of the million. The best teaching in the 



