38 The American Salmon-fisherman. 



In my book " Fly-Rods and Fly-Tackle" the philosophy 

 of the ferrule was discussed at length. I can only add, 

 that further thought, experiment, and experience suggest 

 no change or error therein. For years the manufacture 

 of fly-rods and fly-tackle has been my chief recreation. I 

 believe I may conscientiously say that every effort, except 

 perhaps at the very outset, has been directed, not so 

 much to produce a rod or other implement, as to subject 

 some theory to the crucial test of actual experiment. 



A short ferrule with a cylindrical bore made from 

 tubing drawn inside and out that is, drawn through an 

 annular die upon a polished mandrel for the outside fer- 

 rule, and an inside ferrule without dowels and fitting its 

 mate throughout the length of the insertion, and inserted 

 when the rod is put together until the neighboring ends 

 of the joints are almost if not quite in contact, were there 

 advocated as the best method of uniting the several joints 

 of a trout-rod. 



I now assert what I could not then, since I had not 

 actually tried it, that it is both the simplest and the best 

 known method of jointing a salmon-rod. 



When, during the winter of 1884-85, I announced to 

 some of my angling friends, particularly those in the 

 trade, that I proposed to make a salmon-rod and unite its 

 several joints with ferrules of this description, it was the 

 old story over again. It might answer in a trout-rod, 

 but under the severer strain of a salmon-rod such ferrules 

 would surely split or bend or throw apart, and the first 

 salmon struck would reduce my rod to a wreck and 

 plunge me in that slough of despond into which the 

 angler always sinks when he encounters such a disaster. 



My old argument, that I had used this form of ferrule 



