ARE TROUT CUNNING? 131 



keeping the line taut by a mechanical 

 necessity, which only a salmon or a very 

 large trout could undo, the otter-board is 

 heavily weighted with lead on the sunken 

 rim, just as the kite is weighted on the 

 tail : by the sense of touch through his 

 rod and line, the poacher would know no 

 difference between three ordinary trout on 

 the hooks and three dozen. All he can 

 say to himself is that if he goes on a little 

 longer each of the flies will in all prob- 

 ability be taken by a trout ; and he is right. 

 Soon he turns, and goes back upon his 

 tracks ; and the otter-board comes in, just 

 as the kite would fall if the schoolboy 

 could cause the knot of the flying-string 

 to slip down past the middle of the belly- 

 band ; and lo ! as the poacher's line comes 

 in a trout is dangling from every hook. 



More than one moral for the instruc- 

 tion of the angler could be drawn. A 

 thought that is instant and insistent is 

 that the success of the otter is complete 

 disproof of the theory that the dry fly 

 is on waters which are much fished the 



