xiii THE MIDLAND BROOK 231 



possible to make a legitimate cast. Flicking 

 a fly is an indescribable process by which you 

 make it pass round or through a tree, under 

 a branch and over a bush, until it falls safely 

 upon a square foot of water. If it gets 

 round, under, and over the initial obstacles, 

 the chances are largely in favour of its 

 alighting on the bush which always waits 

 for it on the opposite bank, and which is 

 generally inaccessible. Therefore it stands to 

 reason that flies must be lost. 



Thus for thirty yards or so he wrestles 

 with circumstance without moving or seeing 

 a fish, but presently he comes to a better spot, 

 which is clear of bushes on his own side, 

 though there is a tree. Kneeling behind it 

 he can get his fly onto the water more or 

 less easily. He peeps round the trunk, and 

 finds that he overlooks a tiny rapid above a 

 pool. And there, by all that is fortunate, is 

 a trout lying in the channel between the 

 weeds, alight-coloured fish of about a pound. 

 He trembles a little as he prepares to flick, 

 for it is nervous work fishing for a trout 

 when you can see him, but it does not pre- 

 vent him from flicking the fly just where it 

 ought to go a few inches above the trout's 



