170 Fisnrine is American WATERS. 
casting-line show where the lengths of gut are tied—thus, 
from the stretcher-fly to the first drop are four lengths of 
gut, and three or four lengths from the first drop to the 
hand-fly. These distances will be changed to suit taste 
and the distance of cast. For long casts, the drops should 
be a yard apart. 
No.18. A tie for uniting lengths of gut, so that they will 
break at any other part as easily as at the tie. Tie a knot 
in the end of each length of gut; lap them an inch, and 
wind them closely between the knots with white waxed 
silk. This is the best tie for a salmon leader or a trout 
casting-line. Casting-lines should be made of stained gut, 
the gut selected so as to taper regularly from the reel-line 
to the stretcher-fly ; and the drops should be of fine, clear, 
round gut, stained to the shade of the casting-line. It is 
an indication of very bad taste in a fishing-tackle maker to 
offer finely-tapered and stained casting-lines and flies tied 
to coarse gut, and not dyed or shaded to the tint of the 
casting-line. All should be in harmonious keeping, from 
the reel-line to the casting-line and drops. For casting 
from a boat or from the clear margin of a stream, the cast- 
ing-line should be nine feet in length, or even a foot or two 
more, only have a care not to make it so long that, with the 
bend of a twelve-foot rod, you can not reel up sufficiently 
close to bring your fish within reach of your landing-net. 
For rough fishing on a stream of bramble margins a cast- 
ing-line of from six to seven feet in length, and one drop 
besides the stretcher, may be sufficient. Many anglers dis- 
pense with drops, and fish with one fly only on some streams 
in the interior of Pennsylvania, Maine, New Hampshire, and 
throughout the region in New York known as the Adiron- 
dacks, which is about forty miles square, and one of the 
greatest fish and game regions in America. 
HOW TO STAIN SILK-WORM GUT. 
Gut may be stained by leaving it in a strong decoction of 
