1 1 2 Throw your fly up stream. t Chapt. tii. 



the argument. It may be that some small fish are not 

 so shy as the bigger ones, but some sorts again are ; and 

 you may be very sure that none bite the better for seeing 

 a breech * loading biped making shapes at them from that 

 terra incognita to them, that abode of strange monsters, 

 the shore. None but those which have been fed by hand 

 will be sociable. Therefore, if you go and stand bolt up- 

 right at the very edge of the stream, and don't get sport, 

 don't blame me that is all. Do not you remember how 

 even the little burn trout in Scotland dart away directly 

 they see a Saxon on the bank? 



You will very much improve your sport, if you will 

 condescend to be careful in this matter, even with small 

 fish, and notably with the Barilius Bakeri. They should 

 be fished for just as carefully as a trout. It is well to 

 remember that fish ordinarily lie with their noses up 

 stream, looking in front of them, and, more or less, on 

 each side of them, for what may be brought down to 

 them by the stream, but not behind them; and as you 

 know that their backs are consequently all turned the 

 same way, that is down stream, and they cannot see with 

 their tails, it stands to reason that if you want to ap- 

 proach them unobserved, your best chance of doing so is 

 from below them in the stream; and this is why the 

 most successful fly-fishermen endeavour always to ap- 

 proach a bit of water from below, and take the best fish 



*OnIy breeches filling, but how should the simple fish know better 

 of that moristrum horrendum informe inhabiting 



"The undiscovered country, from whose bourne 

 "No traveller returns." 



