1g2 /ELIAN—FIRST ARTIFICIAL FLY 
were used, and are specially stated to have been used for 
tying only the Macedonian fly, and that this special statement 
of such uses is meant expressly to differentiate the Macedonian 
from all other ways of fishing, and thus constitutes the first 
mention of an Artificial Fly, I counter by a couple of queries. 
Why in XII. 43, and XV. Io, are these self-same wools and 
feathers set out among the necessary ordinary requisite tackle 
of a fisherman, if they were not used for dressing a fly, perhaps 
more primitive but still Artificial? And, if they were not so 
used, to what other fishing purpose can they be fairly applied ? 
Again, let us for a moment grant that the Macedonian 
device was the absolutely new invention or the striking de- 
parture from all preceding angling methods, which, had 
artificial flies not previously been well known, it most certainly 
would have been. In this case, surely A¢lian, meticulous in 
his examination and classification of the tackle, etc., needed 
for each of the four stated kinds of fishing, would have employed, 
when about to tell of this invention, words calling more instant 
attention to and far worthier of this great revolution than the 
simple, “I have heard of the Macedonian way of fishing, and 
it is this”’! 
As supporting my contention, a further point must be 
noted. In the list of tackle in XII. 43, wools and feathers are 
mentioned in a general manner, but in XV. 1, their use is 
particularised and elaborated. Similarly in the first passage 
the making and material of Rods are given, but in the second 
(and here only) the particular length of rod is stated. 
It is on these passages (XII. 43, and XV. 10) and on their 
natural implication, that I chiefly found my conclusion that 
(A) the practice of making up and fishing with some kind of 
artificial fly had been in more or less general use for a long time 
previous to the Macedonian device, and (B) that the device 
is quoted merely as an instance of a special, local, and improved 
adaptation of such usage—in a word as Je dernier cri in flies ! 1 
‘If in Martial (Ep., V. 18. 8) musco, not musca, should be 
1 If Sandys (antea, 185, note 4) be right about Alian’s work being 
“mainly borrowed from Alexander of Myndos,”’ first century a.p., the 
artificial fly was probably well known in Martial’s time. 
