128 ARTIFICIAL BAITS. 



shape of new-fashioned bait, "Archimedean minnows," 

 " sensation baits," " nobbier flies," etc. each one more 

 destructive than any that have been seen in the world 

 before. Truly, they would have one believe that the 

 appetites of the fish were as capricious and as prone to 

 novelty as milliners or young ladies, or as fond of new 

 inventions as a " patent " agent. But I much mistake if 

 the fiftieth part of these are anything but mere shams 

 and stratagems to catch customers ; or absurd improve- 

 ments upon nature, by which the inventor hopes to hand 

 down his name to posterity. 



To suppose that a fish will be tempted to take a fly 

 dressed according to the artificer's imagination, and of a 

 colour totally different from any insect that has ever been 

 upon the face of the earth, in preference to those which 

 constitute his daily and favourite food, is an absurdity ; 

 and to suppose that artificial minnows, worms, and cater- 

 pillars, can be used with more effect than the originals 

 is still worse. No imitations, however well executed, 

 can ever hope to equal the real Simon Pure himself ; 

 and can only at best be used as clumsy substitutes when 

 the real thing cannot be had ; while to place any faith 

 in the efficiency of these new-fangled edibles brass 

 minnows, spoon-baits, and other lusus naturae of that 

 stamp in fishing for trout in ordinary waters, is of all 

 absurdities the king and chief/* 



* The author begs to qualify the above strictures upon the above- 

 named new inventions by stating that he only refers to their use among 

 ordinary trout in what are really and exclusively trout streams clear 

 waters of limited size. What their efficiency may be among the 

 leviathans of the Thames, the Severn, the Trent, etc., or amongst the 



