SPECIAL CONDITIONS— WET-FLY SOLUTIONS 49 



ing ; so, mounting a Tup's Indispensable, I soaked 

 it well, and flicked it over to the edge of the weeds. 

 It lit, and went under, leaving the gut for the 

 most part along the surface. The gut drifted 

 down, the fly end slowly slipping under the upper 

 film. The fly was withdrawn and the cast re- 

 peated. Once more the gut lay along the surface ; 

 once more it slipped slowly through to a point ; 

 then it seemed to move under with a certain 

 decision. I raised my rod-point with a drawing 

 action, and the trout which had defied ten thou- 

 sand dry flies was on. He wasn't quite two pounds, 

 but it doesn't matter. It was generalship which 

 got him, which discerned that in his holt he was 

 possibly accessible to the seductions of the casual 

 nymph-suggesting wet fly in a way in which he 

 was not accessible to the temptations of the too 

 well known dry fly in the place of vantage where 

 he daily fed. 



A POTTED TROUT, AND ONE OTHER. 



When the drowners are out in the water- 

 meadows flushing the ditches till they flood the 

 tables and drench the grasses with water seeking 

 its way back through the herbage to the river by 

 way of ditch, drain, and carrier, the wise old trout 

 who know their business may be found in narrow 

 ditches and channels down to foot-wide runnels in 

 search of the earthworm and the miscellaneous 

 pickings of the grasslands. Again, when July 



7 



