Salmon-fishing — Catching the Fish. 141 



the gaffer gives the order, the anchor is raised clear of 

 the bottom, the canoe drops down with the current until 

 the gaffer thinks the first cast made from the new position 

 will just match on to the last cast from the other, when 

 he orders the anchor down, and the fishing is resumed in 

 the same manner. Thus by alternately anchoring and 

 dropping the canoe down with the current, the pool is 

 fished from end to end — a distance which may possibly 

 be a hundred yards or even more. 



Let us assume, as is often the case, that no salmon has 

 been raised during this ejccursion. But many trout have 

 assuredly been taken. Though this will give little plea- 

 sure, since trout in a salmon-stream are like chubs in a 

 trout-stream — mere vermin — still it may and should be 

 made of great value to the trout-fisherman. The greater 

 his experience and past success in trout-fishing with the 

 fly, the more need has he of the lesson which may then 

 be learned. 



The moment the skilled trout-fisherman sees a dis- 

 turbance in the water near his fly, he retracts it — he 

 " strikes" as instinctively and with as little conscious 

 special volition as when he breathes. 



This habit, however excellent in trout-fishing, is a fatal 

 error in salmon-fishing, and must be overcome. When a 

 salmon so rises as to disturb the surface of the water, it 

 manifests its presence long before it has touched the fly. 

 If the angler then strikes, in the trout-fisher's sense of the 

 term, he simply snatches the fly from the astonished fish, 

 which will probably return to its lair in a state of disgust 

 which no subsequent blandishment will remove. 



Possibly some of the more wicked of us have in our 

 boyhood placed an attractive package in the way of 



