CHAPTER IX. "But now we heed our tired pen's entreaty, - In this our concluding chapter we shall throw together a few general remarks on the practical department of our art, the three seasons into which the angler's year may be divided, — the peculiarities of each, the proper flies to use and why, and other particulars from which we trust our pupils may derive instruction and be enabled to get the ground-work of correct and satisfactory practice. The periods at which the flies enumerated in our list and tables appear upon the water would, perhaps, be understood from what we have said about the natural insects in an early chapter; but our little work will be the more complete and useful, by containing more detailed information on the subject. This chapter, therefore, and the one to which we have referred, should be read in connection with each other. But besides recommending the use of certain flies because of their prototypes being on the water at the particular times ascribed to them, we take care to enumerate those artificial flies which, even considered apart from their supposed resemblance to particular natural insects, will be found in their general character and size to be best adapted to the state of the water and of the atmosphere at the periods and under the circumstances mentioned. In short, we recommend such flies, and give such instructions, as our experience has taught us to consider most likely to obtain the object of fishing,—" the wherewith" to occupy the pannier. The angler's Spring includes February, March, and April after which, for the four succeeding summer months, there is little fishing to be had in the day-time. Evening fishing is then chiefly practised but of that anon. The season of Spring obviously furnishes the greatest amount of sport, for then the fish are generally ravenous for flies, after their long winter's abstinence from them, and the artificial fly is freely taken, because the fish are bolder, and because the comparative scarcity of natural flies, in the earlier period, renders the fish less fastidious in the choice of their favourite food. In February and March, therefore, you need not be over-nice in your combinations of fur and feather. The blue dun (No. 2 in our list) dressed with dark materials, or the red fly for the dropper, with the red palmer for stretcher, all dressed full and on hooks Nos. 3 and 4, Kendal, are as good as any that can be selected. In Devonshire, the almost universal use of the red palmer has passed into a proverb, and the fame of the fly is certainly not undeserved. Its general colour is of that happy medium" which harmonises with most states of the water and atmosphere, and the numerous shades to which it may be varied, in its hackle, and by the omission or otherwise of gold or silver twist on its body - render it peculiarly valuable. We therefore strongly recommend its use in the spring and autumn, dressing it with gold twist only for dark and windy days. We do not like a purely red hackle so well as one with a black list or a furnace hackle, as it is called that is, a hackle with red tips and black close to the quill, as already described in the Chapter on Flymaking. The blue dun, also, as we have before stated, forms an excellent lure, and is not at all less deservedly famed than the palmer. Like the latter, too, its colour admits of so much variation - the shades of blue being so numerousthat it will suit almost every state of the water and of the atmosphere; and, moreover, it forms, when dressed properly, a more exact and insectlike imitation of the natural fly than many of the productions in which nature is poetically said "To live again in art.” You will find that in the beginning of February the trout generally haunt the deep and still parts of the river, to fish which a breeze is necessary; but that in open weather they will, even at that early period, begin to feed in the tails of stickles, and in the gravelly shallows, advancing gradually upwards as the summer approaches. Whatever the season, you should never omit taking advantage of a windy day, when the surface of the water is ruffled, to fish the deep parts of the river, — the ranges, as they are piscatorially denominated. These you should fish slowly and carefully, upwards or downwards as the wind render more convenient, making your first may cast under the bank on which you stand, the next towards the middle of the stream, and so on, cast after cast, towards the other side, taking care to place yourself, whenever practicable, opposite to a higher bank than that on which you stand, in order to be less in the view of your watchful and timid game. You will soon discover the most likely places in which to make your main casts. If the fish do not give you sufficient indication of their whereabouts, by rising, your next best guide will be the course given by the current (if any) to their winged prey, which you will discern floating in regular line, or else driven by the wind into sundry sheltered nooks and corners behind bushes, tufts of grass, and other similar places, in which you will most likely find the trout at home, making a sly and quiet meal. Offer him your flies for a dessert. Perhaps we need hardly state that the angler should endeavour at all times to fish with the wind blowing from behind him, with the view to its assistance in throwing his line; but should he at any time, when fishing in that position during a sun gleam, find the fish suddenly cease rising as he approaches, and refuse every temptation which he may offer, he need be at no loss to account for the circumstance, if he find the sun also at his back thereby throwing his shadow and that of his rod upon the river, and thus exposing all his movements to the fish. We do not attach much importance to the quarter whence the wind blows, though in spring and autumn a south or west, |