OLD JOHN, TIM, & OTHERS 183 



argue wariness on the part of the trout. 

 One might believe that when a trout has 

 risen at a floating fly and gone down 

 without it he has detected or suspected 

 the thing to be a lure. It is pleasant to 

 think so, for much of the fascination of 

 the sport is derived from the feeling that 

 human skiU is matched against astuteness 

 in the fish ; but now I fear that another 

 tradition must be sacrificed, or at least 

 modified. If the trout suspects the 

 artificial fly, he is equally suspicious of 

 the natural. Day by day, as I write, I 

 have been watching his behaviour care- 

 fully. It is not only my fly that he 

 usually misses. He misses the real insect 

 as well. 



Has it been generally noticed that 

 there are at least three different kinds of 

 rises ? There is the rise, in leisurely 

 manner, which is, as it were, finished off" 

 by a slow wave of the trout's tail above 

 the water. That, though I cannot make 

 out why it should be so, is when, early in 

 the day, there are on the water myriads of 



