50 AN ANGLER AT LARGE 



I have accompanied Chavender while he has 

 been fishing, and from observations made I have 

 come to the conclusion that the best angler is not 

 the man who combines the finest casting with the 

 greatest knowledge, the rarest patience with the 

 deadliest guile, the most unyielding resolution 

 with the brightest enthusiasm, but simply he who 

 makes the fewest mistakes. 



Chavender catches fish to which I have cast 

 easily (at the fifth trial when they were no longer 

 there), for whose capture my knowledge should 

 have been adequate, which have not unduly tried 

 my patience, nor made great demands on my 

 craftiness, nor my resolution. As for enthusiasm, 

 mine has burned high just before I have failed to 

 catch these fishes. A chalk-stream trout is often 

 to be found the day after one has put him down, 

 in the same place, rising to the same kind of fly, 

 under the same kind of conditions. Such trout 

 I have indicated to Chavender, and he has grassed 

 them. Why ? Because he has made no mistake. 

 He has waited for a cloud, he has waited for a lull, 

 he has taken note of the weed-beds, he has taken 

 note of the probabilities of drag, he has made a 

 rough guess at the number of duns which that fish 

 lets go by ; in short, he has made his dispositions, 

 reducing the chances of failure to the minimum. 

 Then, deliberately, he has cast and, everything 



