52 AN APOLOGY FOR FISHING 



which you throw your fly is not the spot where a 

 trout lies, if your fly is not well imitated from 

 nature, or does not represent the kind of insect 

 which the fish affects, if the hook is too little con- 

 cealed, or the line too coarse, above all, if you your- 

 self are conspicuous, standing on the bank, your 

 chance of inducing a trout to rise is slender in the 

 extreme. The fact is that the fisherman ought to 

 look at this transaction from the trout's point of 

 view and not from his own. Of the fishing-rod 

 and line, and of the person who manipulates them, 

 the trout must be kept wholly unconscious. This 

 sounds a simple statement enough ; but it does, in 

 fact, imply a great deal. In the first place it 

 implies that both the water and the atmosphere 

 shall be in a condition favourable to the mystifying 

 and confusing of the fish which we are bent on 

 capturing. The atmosphere should not be bright 

 and clear to an excess, nor, by rights, the water 

 either. The water, again, should be, to a certain 

 extent, troubled and agitated. This is effected in a 

 running stream by the current ; but in lakes and 

 calm, deep rivers, especially in the former, it can 

 only be brought about by a certain amount of wind, 

 and for lake-fishing it may therefore be confidently 

 asserted that a slight breeze is absolutely indispen- 

 sable. A line falling on perfectly smooth water, 



