2 PREFACE 



their way into his creel ; if they look at his lure 

 askance and refuse to entertain it, he leaves them for 

 a less sophisticated prey. 



Of the objects supposed to be reproduced in the 

 so-called artificial fly, he is almost entirely ignorant. 

 Not, however, that he prides himself upon the fact or 

 is foolishly contemptuous of the science of insect life ; 

 on the contrary, he is firmly persuaded that the more 

 extensive the angler's knowledge of things connected, 

 even remotely, with his art, the greater the delight 

 he discovers in its practice, but, with the example of 

 Stewart and others before him, he is unconvinced that 

 familiarity with the natural history of the fly is essential 

 to the capture of the fish. He is not impressed by the 

 parade, sometimes entirely spectacular, of entomological 

 learning which has become so prominent a feature of 

 the literature of the rod. 



There will be found in the book no list of artificial 

 flies. The art of simulating nature in the dressing of 

 the lure is one of which the writer has no skill, and 

 from the perplexing diversity of perfect imitations — of 

 the same original — devised by pundits of our art, 

 he finds it impossible to make a choice. But the 

 omission places the reader at no great disadvantage. 

 What information he desires is abundantly supplied in 



