The Coachman. 
The right fly is the fly that catches fish, no 
matter what the color, make-up and size. 
There are some who forget this truism and 
rather than use a lure that under the conditions 
is not authorized by the experts will carry a 
creel as empty as a blown egg. 
I once met an angler who scoffed at my 
coachman. “But I caught these trout, I said, 
showing some fine fish. He poked over a nice 
half-pounder as if he were handling a sucker. 
“I never use a coachman,” he replied with a 
dogmatism that fairly barked at me. There 
isn’t a natural insect on any stream resembling 
that fly.” 
I watched him as he fished the next pool be¬ 
low. making a neat cast, but his basket flopping 
as no creel ought to flop toward afternoon. 
The trout were making circles all around his 
flies, but they did not seem to want the Scotch 
midge he had shown me with such pride. 
David Forster, in his “Scientific Angler,” 
gives Tom Bosworth credit for the invention 
of the coachman. Bosworth was the famous 
royal coachman for three successive British 
rulers; King George IV., William IV., and 
Queen Victoria. He had the reputation of being 
a wonderful fly-fisherman, and was no less noted 
as a “whip,” being so dexterous with the long 
lash used in those days, that while steering four 
gal’oping horses he could snap the pipe from the 
mouth of a passing pedestrian* 
Inventions repeat themselves indefinitely. If 
some one finds that the Chinese had flying ma¬ 
chines in the ’teenth century, B. C., it will sur¬ 
prise none of the students of the history of in¬ 
ventions. And as to Tom of the lash being the 
first to use a fly of the characteristics of the 
coachman, let us turn to Charles Cotton s sec¬ 
ond part of “The Compleat Angler.” 
Cotton describes what he calls a blue dun, 
with a hair dubbing from the combings of a 
black greyhound, and a wing “that can hardly 
be too white.” If this blue dun had a cock’s 
red hackle for legs, as was very likely, there 
are few who would have keen enough eyesight 
to tell the difference from Tom Bosworth’s 
coachman at two yards distance. 
But it really does not matter who invented 
this natty fly of the white wing; any angler can 
buy them at any tackle store and feel certain 
that he has one lure, at least, that will catch 
fish at almost any time, morning, noon or night; 
whether the sun shines, or it rains; if the stream 
is clear as distilled water or the consistency of 
coffee in a fishing country; if the trout are na¬ 
tive, rainbow or brown. 
“What flies are the thing?” two years ago I 
asked an angler, referring to a proposed trip to 
Esopus in the southern Catskills. “You'll prob¬ 
ably carry fifty-eleven different kinds,” he re¬ 
plied, “they all do; but you ready need only 
one—the coachman. The fish up there seem 
*Forster also said, “Bosworth originated the coachman 
fly so much appreciated for night fishing. This arti¬ 
ficial has recently been much used as a fancy fly, for 
day fishing, and with considerable success.”— Editor. 
to know they belong to New York—the new 
water supply system—and they like plenty of 
‘white wings’ around.” 
When I asked a local fisherman concerning 
the lower Neversink, where large brown trout 
are found, his answer was, “Coachman, coach¬ 
man, coachman,” he added, “these brown fel¬ 
lows are old-fashioned; they don’t use autos.” 
In Mrs. Marbury’s “Favorite Flies,” in which 
there are letters from anglers living in every 
part of the United States and Canada, the 
coachman is mentioned more times than any 
other fly. It may be interesting and no less in¬ 
structive to put this in figures. Tom Bos¬ 
worth’s favorite stands first, being recommend¬ 
ed sixty-three times, with the professor second, 
it being referred to in forty-four letters; then 
the brown hackle thirty-seven, the silver doctor, 
Parmacheene belle and grizzly king, twenty-four 
times, and so on down to the queen of the wa¬ 
ter, fifteen. 
Now, fly-fishing is not an exact science; it is 
a good deal like comet astronomy; a sort of 
now-you-hit-now-you-miss kind of business. 
Why a trout wants a particular fly is as unac¬ 
countable as why a girl wants a particular man, 
or a man wants a particular girl. And when 
a trout wants that particular fly, you cannot 
change his desires any more than you can those 
of the aforesaid man or girl. 
It is therefore of the greatest importance to 
throw at a trout what experience has taught 
that he will take nine times out of ten. The 
coachman is such a fly. If trout are feeding, 
nine times out of ten they will rise to that 
lure. Of course there comes the tenth time 
when they will have nothing to do with our 
white-winged friend; they are as little interested 
as an epicure in a favorite dish that he has in¬ 
dulged in for nine successive nights—he wants 
a change. And it is well for his tenth time to 
have a large assortment of many varieties of 
flies. 
A playwright of national reputation used to 
fish the Willowemoc in the neighborhood of De 
Bruce. His success was so remarkable as to 
make his rivals envious to the extent that 
green tinged the trout they were triumphantly 
shown nightly. I once had the temerity to ask 
him what fly he found most successful. The 
answer was as ambiguous as the warning of an 
Athenian sibyl. 
But one day I caught him landing a big trout 
that had something white in its mouth, and 
charged him with the coachman habit. “Why, 
yes,” he said, with assumed indifference, “you 
see, my eyesight is a little poor, and I keep on 
a coachman as a trailer to locate my cast—I 
can see it better than a darker fly.” Through 
his glassess I noted a twinkle as he added, 
“They sometimes take it.” 
“Sometimes take it!” I should thmk they 
did. During the past two fishing seasons I 
have been at the streamside a total of more than 
one hundred and twenty-five days or parts of 
days, and they sometimes took it on not less 
than one hundred and ten! 
There is an almost infallible method in fly¬ 
fishing—catching trout with a fly. It is so cer¬ 
tain that if the angler will make it his own he 
can be as sure of catching trout as he can of 
anything in this uncertain world. And if some 
one suggests that I be presented with a medal 
for my disinterestedness in giving the tip to 
the angling public, I shall feel that it comes to 
me as my right and shall have no scruples in 
taking it. I suggest that it be of gold with a 
coachman in diamonds .on one side, and on the 
other this motto, “Chapeau Bas.” 
Edison must glow internally as he looks up 
Broadway of an evening from Thirty-third 
street; and as I think of what I am about to 
divulge, I feel a complacency that is akin to 
that which must tinge the ego of the great in¬ 
ventor. 
And, like all great inventions, it is extraordi¬ 
narily simple and the concentrated essense of 
experience. But it must be used by those who 
know something concerning the art of angling. 
An African savage, fresh from his hut of leaves, 
could not drive an auto; and a man must be 
able to make a neat cast to use the method I 
am about to explain. But, granted that he is 
fairly skillful with the rod, he can be sure of 
catching more trout than he ever has before. 
This invention consists in always keeping a 
coachman on the leader as the tail or stretcher 
fly. Why it is not successful as a dropper, I 
am at a loss to understand; but, by repeated 
trial, it is not very satisfactory unless at the 
end of the cast. As to size, I have found No. 
io to be best adapted for the streams of New 
York State. On large rivers like those on the 
north shore of Lake Superior, a much larger 
fly would be successful. 
The very simplicity of this method commends 
it. It is not the complicated ideas that are 
most generally of the greatest service; all 
science and art aim at an economy of means 
for a desired end. 
My claim for the coachman used always as a 
tail or stretcher fly, is that it will give results 
not attainable by other methods. And by using 
three flies—two droppers and the coachman— 
any number of varieties can in turn be pre¬ 
sented, always keeping the coachman as the im¬ 
portant fly of the cast. 
There is one certain way for the angler to 
prove the practical value of my contention— 
to try it. That is easy, and the coachman can 
be bought at all tackle stores, even those that 
keep a small assortment of flies. 
If an angler wi‘l keep a coachman as the 
stretcher fly for one angling trip, never remov¬ 
ing it but to put on a fresh one, I am as sure 
of his complete conversion to my method as I 
am that he will catch more trout than he has 
even in his wildest and most ambitious dreams 
believed possible. Ladd Plumley. 
All the fish lazvs of the United States and 
Canada, revised to dale and nozv in force, are 
given in the Game Lazvs in Brief. See adv. 
