48 AN ANGLER'S HOURS m 



much previous meditation ; in his London 

 chambers he has wasted many valuable 

 minutes in considering exactly how he 

 should make it and with what result. The 

 result has seldom been much under a pound. 

 But anticipation, as a rule, has no connection 

 with fact. In this instance the first cast is 

 not entirely successful. The leader reaches 

 the water, it is true, but it is surrounded with 

 what some angling authority calls " beauti- 

 ful but useless " coils of gut, and, of course, 

 no fish rises at so strange a phenomenon. 



At the third cast, however, he is more 

 fortunate, and there is a flash of yellow in the 

 neighbourhood of the second dropper. He 

 strikes and just pricks the fish, or so it 

 seems. But as he makes his next cast he 

 hears a sharp crack in the air behind him. 

 " Struck too hard," he murmurs, and pulls 

 his line in hand-over-hand to see the extent 

 of the damage. As he suspected, the second 

 dropper is gone, but he consoles himself 

 with the thought that he is a little out of 

 practice, and that he must expect to strike 

 ofF a few flies on the first day. He opens 

 his fly -book and takes out another blue 

 upright, moistening the gut in his mouth 



