6 SALMON AND TROUT. 



may be reference to argumentative or controversial matters, now 

 possessing little beyond an ' academical ' interest, and limit the 

 scope of the following pages to explaining my own Eyed-hook 

 system in its most recent development, as applicable both to 

 salmon and trout flies. Its applicability to all kinds of float- 

 fishing, &c., and to sea-fishing is dealt with in Volume II. 



To begin with Salmon Flies. 



Although in the case of the salmon fly — when dressed, that 

 is, in the more ordinary way with a gut loop— the paramount 

 and self-evident advantages for the eyed-hook principle that 

 may be claimed in the case of the trout fly do not present 

 themselves, yet there are several points, and those not un- 

 important ones, in which the metal-eyed salmon hook offers a 

 distinct advance over ' lapped-on ' hooks. 



Take, for instance, probably the most obvious point, the 

 question of durability. The life of the old-fashioned salmon 

 fly, whether tied on a strand of gut or on a gut loop, is 

 measured by that of the waxed lapping that binds the gut 

 or gut loop to the hook-shank— the period, in other words, 

 during which the wax retains its adhesiveness ; and this, it is 

 well known, it does not do for more than a limited— and, 

 moreover, an uncertainly limited — time. The hook and the 

 rest of the fly, on the contrary, when preserved from moth and 

 rust, are for practical purposes indestructible, and if either 

 should happen to give out the fact is easily discovered, and 

 does not in its discovery entail losing the best fish, perhaps, 

 of the season. The pleasure of possessing and keeping up a 

 good stock of salmon flies is sadly alloyed by the reflection 

 that after a few years prudence would counsel their being con- 

 signed to the nearest dust-hole. 



Again, as regards the comparative neatness of the two 

 systems, the verdict would probably be in favour of the metal 

 eye, although the difference is but trifling. 



There are no ^/^-advantages of any kind that I am aware 

 of as a set-off to the foregoing advantages, and therefore, 

 weighing impartially the two systems — gut loops v. metal 



