MAY. 55 
pound to two pounds weight. He was dexterous in whip- 
ping his flies beneath bushes, and over the haunts of large 
trout. His favorite fly was the freckled dun, the produce 
of the stickbait, which he called his “moorcock and spicy 
silk.” But the first generation of the freckled dun had 
past, or was eclipsed by the green drake, then in full force; 
and the artificial green drake in the sunny calm, was in 
total eclipse by the living fly ; which would have filled a 
pannier in an hour. Those who practice flyfishing in all 
its varieties, find, amidst the changes of weather and waters, 
suitable times and occasions for either, and neither overrate 
the one or undervalue the other. 
63RD.—GREY DRAKE.*—Size about the same as the green 
drake, but smarter, and shews her real colors. Wings 
transparent and sparkling, of an inky tinge, with dark or 
black veins and crossings, thickening to the shoulders, the 
tops of which are dark; and the spots or marks on the 
joints of the body dark and distinct, of a deep red or black 
brown ground. Body and shoulders a creamy yellow white, 
dimly transparent ; some with long whisks and long fore- 
legs, of a light ale tinge and transparency ; case or pellet 
eyes—which varieties appear in some individuals—of most 
species of the drakes. 
Hackled for wings with a black cock’s hackle ; for legs 
fibres of red brown hair ; body, light cream colored smooth 
woollen thread, warped with eight or nine open rounds of 
brown floss silk. 
The grey drake continues the history of the green one; 
unencumbered with the green mantle, the grey drake pur- 
sues her pleasures with ease and vivacity. She shuns the 
(35) This fiy is the metamorphosis of the female ‘‘ Green Drake,” it is said by 
some authorities to be a good evening fly, but I cannot speak very highly of it from 
my own experience ; the author’s dressing is too dark, and would more closely imitate 
the “ Black Drake,” to which the male ‘‘ Green Drake”’ changes; the best material 
to employ for the wings is that recommended both by Jackson and Ronalds, viz,, the 
mottled feather from a mallard, stained faintly purple. 
