366 SALMON AND TROUT. 
without splash. The checking of the hand serves a twofold 
purpose ; firstly, causing the fly to land on the surface without 
disturbance, and secondly, delivering it with plenty of slack line, 
which, as shown later on, will prevent or retard its dragging. 
If it is necessary to make a very long cast, the hand when 
travelling back must be raised above the level of the head, so 
as to lift the line as high as possible behind. This is called the 
steeple cast. It.may be laid down as an axiom that the distance 
an angler can cast is limited by the length of line he can keep 
in the air behind, with the addition of a few yards he can side 
from the hand while delivering the fly ; hence the advantage of 
steepling when trying to make an extra long throw. It is also 
necessary to steeple when there is a bank or bushes imme- 
diately behind the angler; even with very long grass it is often 
useful. 
If the wind is dead in the face of the fisherman he must use 
a somewhat shorter length of gut, and follow the previous in- 
structions for casting, up to the point of delivering the fly ; but 
when the arm attains the angle of 45° with the plane of the 
water it must be well extended, the knuckles turned down, and 
a cut made downwards and towards the body, the elbow being 
at the same time raised and the rod-point carried down to the 
level of the water. If accurately timed, this back motion acts 
as a check, and the result is that the line is extended in the 
teeth of the wind, the fly travelling out straight, and falling 
lightly and without disturbance. This is called the downward 
cut, 
For fishing against a very light wind, or across any breeze 
short of half a gale, no style of casting is to be compared with 
the underhanded ox horizontal cast. As may be inferred from 
its name, it is a cast made underhanded or with the rod held 
in a horizontal position. The movements are precisely similar 
to those of the overhanded cast, except that the rod is in a 
horizontal instead of a vertical position, and the motion of it 
is in a direction parallel to the surface of the water instead of 
at right angles to it, as in the case of the overhanded cast. 
