xm THE MIDLAND BROOK 221 



for the water - skaters and the occasional 

 bubbles caused by an eel, and you fish on 

 without the least encouragement, until you 

 begin to doubt whether there is a trout in 

 the stream at all. But if you are lucky 

 enough to be at hand on the one evening, 

 and to happen upon the right fly, you may 

 make up for a good many blank days. 



To be successful in brook-fishing needs a 

 long and patient apprenticeship. It takes 

 years to understand even one brook; but there 

 is this much of consolation in the matter, 

 that when you thoroughly know one you 

 are much better able to cope with others, 

 for they all have many characteristics in 

 common. They all have much the same 

 variations of stream and pool, of mill-head 

 and mill-tail ; they all abound in old stumps 

 and willow-roots ; and they all have an occa- 

 sional waterfall or weir, with a floodgate in 

 the pool above it. So it comes about that the 

 best places for trout in one brook have their 

 counterparts in another, and the practised 

 eye can detect them at once. It does not 

 follow, of course, that the fish are to be 

 caught ; but it is something to know where 

 one has the best chance of catching them, 



