WHY IS ONE FLY PREFERRED TO OTHERS ? 75 



all waters and all seasons, " the hare ear and woodcock 

 wing," which has a better claim to notice than many 

 creations of the fly-dresser's fancy, as its natural prototype 

 visits the water in May, we may find it an excellent 

 killer in its proper season. It may also be at all times 

 attractive in remote northern rivers, for anything I 

 know to the contrary ; but for my own part I never 

 could succeed in bringing to land above half a dozen 

 fish in my life with it, out of its own season, in the 

 Northumbrian streams, and I have tried it frequently. 

 How does it happen then, that it is more successful at 

 one particular season (the month of May), than any 

 other ? Again, if it be true, as many assert, that trout 

 seize indiscriminately upon anything that bears a re- 

 semblance to an insect in motion through the water ; 

 how comes it, that perhaps one particular fly of a certain 

 colour upon the cast will take nearly every fish that is 

 caught during a whole day's fishing, while the others, 

 equally well dressed, and equally resembling living 

 insects, will scarcely take one ? -a fact patent to every 

 experienced fly-fisher. How again does it happen that 

 many a sportsman, though provided with the most 

 beautiful of flies, may sometimes continue thrashing the 

 water like a battery of men and angels, and with all the 

 energy of desperation, without being rewarded by any- 

 thing but disappointed hopes ; while the fish all around 

 him literally keep the water in a boil, with their risings 

 at the natural fly ? The answers will soon be discovered 

 if he will condescend to lay hold of one of the real 

 insects on which the trouts are feeding, and attach -tp 



