108 THE TROUT ARE RISING 
“TI thought you'd get him, sir,” said the water- 
bailiff. 
My fourth triumph (I regarded each capture 
as a triumph then) was on the old little river, the 
Tern, at Market Drayton. A trout kept rising, 
but he ignored the wet fly, three times changed. 
Then I perceived that he was feeding on a small 
black gnat. Promptly I put on one, dry. In- 
stantly the trout came to terms, and was landed. 
“That’s what I call good fishing!” said some 
kind onlooker on the opposite bank. In point 
of fact, it was fair fishing, long delayed, for obser- 
vation ought to have got to work sooner. But it 
is nice to put on record his generous words, as a 
set-off against certain unfavourable comments 
(doubtless deserved) that have come my way. 
Perhaps the most picturesque was that of my 
friend, the Major. He contemplated a knot 
which I had tied in my cast, and said, “ What a 
knot! Are you trying to invent something to 
anchor a man-of-war with?” But one improves, 
and the Major is a just man. I am glad to be 
able to record that later he was constrained to 
observe, “Glad to see that at last you can tie a 
knot looking a little less like St. Paul’s 
Cathedral.” 
I have caught other trout on the dry fly, but 
the instances recorded have somehow impressed 
me most, and I had not hitherto taken the busi- 
ness as a matter of course. On the Teme, how- 
ever, one got into the habit of coming back with 
grayling, all taken on the dry fly ; and, although 
