72 CHARACTERISTICS OF A TRUE SPORTSMAN. 



observation. The amount and kind of knowledge that 

 is only sufficient to enable its possessor to capture fish 

 by the rule of thumb or, in other words, no rule at all 

 except blind chance however well it may beseem the 

 narrow capacity of the pot-fisher, who cares for nothing 

 but the carcases of the fish, and would as readily take 

 them by the net, as by any other means, is totally in- 

 compatible with the critical and varied acquirements of 

 anyone who aspires to the dignity of a true angler. 



I do not by any means regard that man as entitled 

 to the designation of a sportsman whether he be a 

 shooter, a fisher, or a fox-hunter who merely prides him- 

 self upon the quantity of birds or fish he can manage to 

 kill, or the number of horses he can gallop to death, in 

 the course of the season. The nocturnal poacher can 

 achieve quite as great things with his nets, either in the 

 fields or the waters, while a trained monkey could un- 

 questionably perform feats equally sensational and 

 irrational, over five-barred gates, break-neck stiles, and 

 bottomless quagmires, probably in a much superior style, 

 for Jocko can stick to a horse's back like a ball of wax, 

 and in this respect excels any of his human prototypes. 



It is different, however, with the scientific angler. 

 He would glory much more in taking half a dozen fish, 

 in difficult water and weather, when the best efforts of 

 the " rule-o'-thumb" fraternity were of no avail, by the 

 exercise of superior judgment in using a fly proper 

 for the season and water, than in capturing whole 

 creelfuls, in some remote moorland burn, where the 

 hungry fry will voraciously gulp down anything having 



