Off SALMON FLIES. 67 



must all be imitations of shrimps, though unwit- 

 tingly so designed. 



The living parson has copied a fly from one bright 

 yellow shrimp, found it a killer, and named it after 

 himself; but from a handful or two of shrimps I 

 shall pick out a dozen, in which his six pictured fa- 

 vourite Earn flies and my half-dozen of Tweed ones, 

 will be found a resemblance as near as if imitated 

 intentionally ; and these may be even more like when 

 moving in the water. And shrimps are as varied in 

 their colours as are a flock of fancy pigeons,* and of 

 all sizes too, the same as we make salmon flies. 



It would appear then, that all along in making up 

 our salmon flies, we have, by a repetition of experi- 

 mental trials, been arriving at effect, without advert- 

 ing to the proper type as the cause. Who of those 

 who in primitive ages " cast angle in the brooks" 

 would first conceive the notion of what we call the 

 salmon fly (like no living fly that has been seen), or 

 what might suggest such idea to their imagination, 

 must remain, as it has hitherto been, undeclared, and 

 unremarked, even in tradition. It would be a curi- 



* We doubt if John is entirely correct as to the colour of shrimps. 

 We have many a time caught them, both on dull and sunny days, and 

 their colour always seemed the same or nearly so. When the sun shone 

 we occasionally noticed a light or faint shade of steel blue upon some 

 of them, but so faint that the natural colour was still the predomi- 

 nating one, namely, that of sea sand. {EDE. J 



