ARTIEICIAL FLIES. 119 
brown and stripped the stem on both sides, to the few fibres 
he intended to remain, which he closed together with his 
lips, and then laid it aside. He waxed the ends of the silk, 
hair, and shank of the hook, whipping three or four open 
rounds of the waxed silk tightly up the bare hook to the top 
and turned near half way back. He then laid the waxed 
end of the hair within the hook and whipped them close 
and tightly together to the top, and formed the head. Wax- 
ing the silk at the lap, he plied to it a few hairs from a 
hare’s ear, then laid the thicker part of the stem of the 
feather at the fibres, close to the silk at the lap, and whipped 
over it; then cutting off the surplus stem, whipped tightly 
down the length of the shoulders and fastened. He next 
took the feather in his pliers by the small end and wound 
it twice over the shoulders, tight as it would bear, keeping 
the stem straight by the twirl of the pliers; and the fibres 
pointing over the head, whipped it to, at the low shoulder ; 
and, after cutting off the surplus, whipped tightly down to 
the bend and carefully back again, to form the body ; then 
fastened, and cut the silk close off. He finished with a pin, 
separating and straightening the fibres of the feather, pinch- 
ing the upper ones together for the wings, and trimming 
and adjusting the under parts, for the legs; then cast his 
fiy on the water. 
Absent or ill-made and ill-matched flies are bad to depend 
on; also flies of our own design or fancy ; for we cannot 
design or finish equal to Nature. The best we can do is to 
copy her designs and finish after her in the best way we 
can. The first business of the small flyfisher is with the 
aquatic flies of the day, which, if he cannot see out or on 
the water, he may oft on spider’s webs, or he may find them 
with their creepers at their times of hatching, at the edges 
of the streams, the same as the creeper and stone fly. An 
hour or two spent in research and observation at intervals 
through a season, will give a truer and more correct know- 
