OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 



meant by fly-fishing ? Of course the object is to deceive the 

 trout into the belief that he sees a real live fly. Which is most 

 likely to deceive him a fly cast above him and gently floating 

 down to him, or one cast in the ordinary fashion, and madly 

 crossing the stream at eccentric angles and with galvanised 

 jerks ? Real insects never cross a stream driving up against the 

 current by superhuman, not to say superinsectine, leaps and 

 plunges. Fish may be caught by flies drawn up and across the 

 stream ; but nature's way is the best, and that floats flies down 

 stream. Of course in dark and coloured waters the difference is 

 less important ; but Mr Stewart's lesson is how to kill trout in 

 clear water. And we heartily subscribe to his canons with the 

 modification that casting up stream is not to be always straight 

 up, but diagonally, going over the whole water, but still casting 

 upwards. Another very sensible observation of Mr. Stewart is 

 that the colour of a fly is not half so important as the way in 

 which it is made to fall and float on the water. A small fly 

 and clear gut are sine guibus non; and the thing to aim at is the 

 appearance of life, not colour, in your artificial bait. A more 

 practical, sound, sensible, and unpretending book we never read, 

 and we recommend it without abatement or qualification." 



THE FIELD. 



" The modest unpretending little volume before us is decidedly 

 welcome. The Practical Angler we like the title. We are pre- 

 pared to find something practical in it, and thanks be, for once we 

 are not deceived. It is practical in every sense of the word. . . . 

 We can recommend this little book to tyros or anglers in the 

 transition state of every grade and shade, and even the finished 

 practitioner may find in it something worthy of notice." 



JOHN BULL. 



. . . . " But the author needs no excuse, and has limited 

 himself to no specialty. He has given us the very best hand- 

 book of angling that we know of ; and it is a material part of its 

 merits that it occupies so small a compass ; for most anglers, how- 

 ever they may affect a voluminous fishing-book, are disposed to 

 cavil at prolixity in a treatise on this science. Short as it is, the 

 work contains all that is needed, either for the fly at the one end 

 of the machinery, or the angler at the other. How to make your 

 fly, how to throw it ; how to hook your fish, how to land it ; all 

 about your own habits and those of the trout, is told in a simple 

 and sportsmanlike style. Mr. Stewart is the Colonel Hawker of 

 fishing." 



