62 NORTH-COUNTRY FLIES. 



The legal trout season opens on the 2nd of February, 

 and although trout will occasionally take a fly greedily all 

 through that month, and odd fish may be found in very 

 good condition, they have not had sufficient time in which 

 to recover health and strength after the spawning season, 

 and the angler who values his art as a true sportsman 

 should, will give them a longer respite. On many of the 

 Yorkshire waters no fishing is allowed before the 1st of 

 April, and if there is any error in fixing this date it is on 

 the right side. It would be very desirable that the close 

 season for trout should be extended from the 2nd of 

 February to the I5th of March, the day on which the close 

 season for coarse fish commences. 



I may add a sentence on a little matter of detail. The 

 vast majority of fish-hooks are coloured to much too 

 deep a blue. My readers are doubtless familiar with 

 the process of colouring. Experiments I have witnessed 

 convince me that a hook coloured to brown only has 

 two important advantages : first, it more nearly resembles 

 the colour of by far the larger number of flies ; and second, 

 it conveys to the eye the impression that it is smaller than 

 a blue one. 



If one sentence or idea written in this book serves to 

 stimulate a love of angling, the author will be amply 

 rewarded. Alone amongst all field sports success still 

 depends on man's own skill and wariness, and his finny 

 prey are just as wild and untamable as they were ages 

 ago. 



And it is not alone the sport of catching fish which 

 constitutes the charm of Angling : there is in every one of 

 us an innate love of Nature in her purest and her simplest 

 phases : the meanest child will stop instinctively to pull the 

 wayside flower. As of old, Angling is still the Contemplative 

 Man's Recreation : the soothing influence of one bright day 



