FLY FISHING FOR TROUT AND GRAYLING. 297 
ought to kill—whether they will do so, or be wasted as good 
meat is by a bad cook, depends on the handling of my rod. I 
have yet to throw over the fish, to hook him, and to play him 
when hooked. I would say a word on each of these processes, 
and do not despair of advancing under each head something 
at once new and true. This would be scarcely possible had 
writers qualified their general rules by drawing the requisite 
distinctions. We are told, for instance, to throw a perfectly 
straight line, that we may reach the farther and strike with the 
greater certainty, and I admit the general principle. But ona 
bright day and in a much-fished stream, such casting will not 
serve your turn, unless you aim at reaching an individual fish. 
Rather shake out your flies loosely, with a quivering motion of 
the rod, and let your links of gut drop lightly, in irregular un- 
dulations. The greenest trout, under such circumstances, takes 
alarm at a ‘straight line’ drawn across the surface of the water. 
Bear the same consideration in mind when working your flies 
down and across the stream. 
Again, in throwing for a fish whose exact position you know, 
all the books tell you to cast two or three feet above him, and 
let the stream carry the fly down to the expectant trout—a 
good rule doubtless, for the general guidance of a tyro, but for 
the more advanced piscator, in sultry weather and bright shy 
waters, in place of ‘feet’ he may safely read ‘inches.’ It will 
not do diez to let an old trout scan and study the insect ap- 
proaching him. Drop the fly treet ower his neb,’ as a young 
familiar of mine at Driffield used to phrase it, and ten to one, 
having no space for reflection, he will ‘take the death’ on the 
impulse of the moment. 
Connected with the first dropping of the fly is the working 
of it on and in the water. Drawing it straight along, especially 
up stream, though common, is a ruinous error. In salmon 
fishing this is well known: the line is slackened at short 
intervals between the sweeping movements of the fly across 
and against the stream; and the lure is made lifelike and 
attractive by the alternate contraction and expansion of the 
