6 SALMON AND TROUT. 
may be reference to argumentative or controversial matters, now 
possessing little beyond an ‘academical ’ interest, and limit the 
scope of the following pages to explaining my own Eyed-hook 
system in its most recent development, as applicable both to 
salmon and trout flies. Its applicability to all kinds of float- 
fishing, &c., and to sea-fishing is dealt with in Volume II. 
To begin with Salmon Flies. 
Although in the case of the salmon fly—when dressed, that 
is, in the more ordinary way with a gut loop—the paramount 
and self-evident advantages for the eyed-hook principle that 
may be claimed in the case of the trout fly do not present 
themselves, yet there are several points, and those not un- 
important ones, in which the metal-eyed salmon hook offers a 
distinct advance over ‘lapped-on’ hooks. 
Take, for instance, probably the most obvious point, the 
question of durability. The life of the old-fashioned salmon 
fly, whether tied on a strand of gut or on a gut loop, is 
measured by that of the waxed lapping that binds the gut 
or gut loop to the hook-shank—the period, in other words, 
during which the wax retains its adhesiveness ; and this, it is 
well known, it does not do for more than a limited—and, 
moreover, an uncertainly limited—time. The hook and the 
rest of the fly, on the contrary, when preserved from moth and 
rust, are for practical purposes indestructible, and if either 
should happen to give out the fact is easily discovered, and 
does not in its discovery entail losing the best fish, perhaps, 
ofthe season. The pleasure of possessing and keeping up a 
good stock of salmon flies is sadly alloyed by the reflection 
that ana years prudence would counsel their being con- 
signed to'thé nearest dust-hole. 
Again, .ag regards, the omparative neatness of the two 
systems, the verdict would {probably be in favour of the metal 
eye, although the difference is\ but trifling. 
There are no d@s-advantages of any kind that I am aware 
of as a set-off to the foregoing advantages, and therefore, 
weighing impartially the two ‘systems—gut loops v. metal 
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