I  ha/e  never  yet  been  able  to  tell  why  a  salmon,
who  is  a  kind  of  chivalrous  gentleman,  a  man  of  brains
among  fish,  should  be  deceived  and  taken  by  a  wretch-
ed counterfeit  upon,  indeed  a  burlesque  of  nature,  called
a  fly.  The  things  which  are  made  in  shops  look  no
more  like  the  real  winged  insects  upon  which  the  fish
feeds  than  a  rainbow  looks  like  a  dull  gray  cloud.  It
is  pretty  evident  to  my  mind  that  the  success  of  an
artificial  fly  does  not  depend  in  any  degree  upon  its
having  the  general  contour  of  a  bug  or  natural  fly,  but
upon  a  certain  attractive  combination  of  colors.  I  have
caught  trout,  certainly,  and  they  are  younger  members
of  the  salmon  family,  with  a  fly  which  any  living  thing
would  blush  to  look  like.  The  shi  '  seems  to  have
nothing  to  do  with  its  killing  quality,  and  the  colors
used  may  not  be  likened  jnto  any  thing  in  heaven
above  or  the  earth  beneath.  If  yon  can  catch  the
fish's  eye,  you  catch  the  fish.  I  have  tried  the  vari-
ous, and  in  some  cases  commendable  imitations  of  the
house-fly  and  the  gadfly  and  the  moth  of  which  the
market  is  full,  but  I  never  had  any  success  with  them.
148


Starboard  and  Port.
