VI 

 THE FIRST DRY-FLY DAY 



THE first dry-fly day! Freedom to ramble 

 in the valley of a South of England chalk- 

 stream in the month of May. A valley shut 

 in by down-lands, its sides clothed with copses 

 of beech-trees ringing with the song of birds. 

 Water-meadows blazing with colour and the 

 crystal waters of the stream itself meandering 

 through them. Freedom to fish with the dry- 

 fly for trout from some of those meadows ! 

 The country-side at its very best, and the climax 

 of a fisherman's expectation during a long 

 winter in these parts at last arriving. A good 

 hatch of fly seen yesterday, and every prospect 

 of another to-day. 



I am just back from my first dry-fly day, 

 tired out but happy. The Chancellor of the 

 Exchequer can do his worst and I shall bear 

 him no ill-will. I have the luck to know the 

 tenant of the mill, with fishing rights on both 

 banks for about four hundred yards of copse 

 and meadow. He lets me go there whenever 



73 



