FLIES AND KNOTS. 265 



waters under the earth, and that the sharp-sighted fish are 

 never deceived by thinking ours the natural insect, bui 

 take him for some new and undescribed species. As for 

 myself, to use the quaint language of the editor of the 

 " Knickerbocker," " sometimes I think so, and then again 

 I don't, but mostly 1 do." On certain occasions it would 

 seem that the closer the imitation the better, on others the 

 less the similarity the greater the success. Upon this 

 question my friends stand like the hackle on a well- 

 dressed fly, " every which way." At any rate, it is no 

 time to be dubbing when you ought to be fishing, and 

 if you cast a long line and a light fly and the fish will 

 not rise, you may be sure they will not. 



The various flies that appear upon the surface of the 

 numerous and varying waters of our country, from the 

 borders of Mexico to the confines of Labrador, would fur- 

 nish the subject for an instructive and interesting work. 



The natural files, whether hatched from the caddis at 

 the bottom of the streams, or from the burrows in the 

 ground, or the knots on the limbs, or the cocoons amid 

 the leaves of trees, are more numerous than those of any 

 European country. As a class, they are larger, the 

 ephemerae especially, and although often found to be 

 similar in general appearance, furnish many species 

 unknown there. They have never been properly de- 

 scribed and classified, and no satisfactory work has been 

 written, at all thorough and reliable, in which an attempt 

 is made to record their nature and habits. 



Many of them do not return every year, but seem to 

 require several seasons to mature, and the earliest fly of 

 one season may not be that of another. Every observant 



