52 A SCOTTISH FLY-FISHER 



If he desires to be thoroughly scientific he will em- 

 ploy the fly dry. 



The merely human eye is incapable of distinguishing 

 the colour of an opaque object viewed against the light, 

 but the physical conditions which lin)it, the vision of 

 man appear to leave the vision of the trout unfettered. 

 That amazing fish discriminates instantly and easily 

 between two closely allied shades of colour even in the 

 dark, or when seen against the sky or through the 

 medium of several feet of broken and discoloured water. 

 Not all the evidence arrayed in its defence can persuade 

 us to believe it. 



The fish which perceives nothing unusual in the 

 abnormal anatomy of the artificial fly is unlikely to have 

 his apprehension roused by a slight, or even by a con- 

 siderable, anomaly of colour. Not, perhaps, that colour 

 is altogether without importance ; there is a general 

 agreement even among those who scoff at the innocent 

 faith of the ardent worshippers at Nature's shrine, that 

 the fish is not uninfluenced by the colour of the lure. 

 But they find the trout inconstant in his affections ; the 

 colour which to-day attracts his roving fancy, to-morrow 

 lacks all charm for him. Stewart, the characteristic 

 feature of whose Practical Angler is strong common- 

 sense, — in many things we think alike — was of opinion 



