120 The American Salmon-fisherman. 



fers only in that it is of even greater importance. If 

 the beginner will but grasp the rod at its extreme lower 

 end, and make that end the pivot upon which the rod 

 swings, bring his upper hand as close to the reel as 

 the length of the rod and his physical strength will con- 

 veniently permit, that the amplitude of motion of that 

 hand may be reduced to a minimum, and then, treating 

 the lower hand almost as if it were a mere socket, compel 

 the upper hand to conform to the motion of the rod he 

 will find little embarrassment from this cause at the out- 

 set, and none at all after a very little practice. He will 

 then not only be able to cast over either shoulder with 

 equal indifference and efficiency, but he will be able to 

 substitute the position of one hand for that of the other 

 whenever the approach of fatigue suggests the change. 



Perhaps no mental constitution is more rare than that 

 which enables the old and experienced to remember their 

 youth or their novitiate, and to so recall the obstacles 

 which then beset their path as to place them before the 

 beginner, and show him how they may be avoided. Self- 

 evident as it must appear upon the least consideration 

 that the foregoing principle lies at the very root of facil- 

 ity in the use of a salmon-rod, still neither from any of 

 the many books which I consulted, nor from any of my 

 expert friends, did I receive the slightest intimation of 

 its existence. To author and angler alike the day when 

 they first stood rod in hand upon the bank of a salmon- 

 river, and their early struggles at the foot of the rugged 

 hill of knowledge, had become a memory too vague and 

 shadowy to be recalled. The higher phases of the art, 

 particularly in reference to those points as to which the 

 most skilled differ in theory and practice, they could dis- 



