The Roanoke times. [volume] (Roanoke, Va.) 1890-1895, 1892-09-06
TROUT AND FLIES
sUPERsTITIoNs THAT ANGLERS IN.
vARlABLY FOLLOW.

Angling on the Itchen, the Test and all
other fashionable trout streams is governed
by rigid law that the fly is the only per-
missible lure. No sportsman questions the
tradition, which indeed is so thoroughly
established that the very poacher in the
dead OF night would blush ut the thought
OF using anything grosser than an alder.
Nearly all etiquettes, howsoever difficult
1t may be to perceive what originally gave
rise to them, are rational at bottom; but
this one seems an exception. There Is no
obvious reason why worm or gentles or the
Alexandra fly or even minnoY should be
tabooed. At least there Is none that we
can see.
Perhaps If one were venturesome enough
to ask Hampshire fisherman in what
respect minnow Is offensive, we should
be told that it falls into the water with q
shocking splash. The splash is undeniable;
but surely it is an inadequate explanation
of the taboo. A minnow is not the only
thing that splashes. We have seen the
lightest dry fly splash abominably, to the
obvious terror of the trout; and the Hamp-
shire fisherman himself splashes, for he in
variaby wades, and III that act dsturbs
the water in half an hour more than all
the minnows in the tackle shops could pos.
sibly do in day.
Its equally impossible to think that the
Objectionable characteristic of the minnow
Is that it is too killing. The minnow is not
killing at all. He who could do any good
with minnow in the pellucid waters of a
chalk stream would be an artist of incom-
parable skill The trout usually flee an
anglers minnow in perturbation CON-
pared with which the author of "Salome's"
displeasurc with the lord chamberlain Is
equanimity. Can it be, then, that in Ia
Inv fta ,,,f,
making virtue Of a necessity, and not
countenancing it merely because it is use.
lesss We might incline to this conjecture,
If it were not that the best managed dry
lily is usually useless too. Why are our
modern fishermen so fastidious aus to the
means by which they achieve failureS
Illumination on the gentle makes the
subject darker than ever. Indeed gentles,
which may be defined us maggots WASH
grubs, caddis or any other white creeping
things, are treated according to code of
angling morals which is quite inexplicably
arbitrary. You must not use gentle
when it is ''stone bait;' but you do a
highly meritorious action when, ten min
utes afterward, he has taken to himself
the wings of the grcendrakc and YOU seize
him TO adorn tail. You must not use n
maggot from tho butchers; but you are at
liberty to put u bit of white leather on a
dy hook, and that oddly enough is some
times lure more deadly than the gentle
OF which 1t Is intended to be an imitation.
You must not use an Alexandra, but no.
body will hinder you from working with
2-inch Jock Scott If you are fool enough
to prefer TINT means Of failure
There Is, however, a reason for this par
ticular taboo 1t is founded upon a wis
dom akin to that Of Theophile Gautier's
cat which, hearing parrot speak, re-
marked refiectively: "This Ia not bird
This is a gentleman. Listen to his CONVEX
sation! In the estimate of the conscien-
tious fisherman. the Alexandra fly ID not a
ny. 1t is Il minnow. Its dressing of feath-
ers looks like wings; but there are three
hooks underneath, and when the thing Is
in the water it has the appearance of a
green minnow.
Thus far the philosophy of the taboo Is
unimpeachable; but we can 90 no further.
The Alexandra's resemblance to a minpow
is no closer than that of brown hackle to
spider, which is SO little close that we
have the audacity to doubt whether the
trout feels himself to be rising at spider
when we feel that it is spider we are Of
fering him. What cause indeed have we
to believe that fish take our lures In the
spirit in which they are given? Is 1t not
pretty we'll ascertained that there Is no fly,
no shrimp, no prawn which has any like
ness to the blue devils, the thunder-and-
iightnings and other engines on which
salmon willingly impale themselvess What
can n trout be thinking of when it snaps at
parr tail? Let US hope that anglers will
not allow this SO called Nineteenth century
to pass away with the premises of their
science unrevised. 1t Is high time they
were considering the possibility that fish
take some lures merely for the fun of the
thing, or by way of resenting an insult,
and not because the lures seem something
good to eat.
Having gone SO far in heresy, we may as
we'll say word for the worm ANY one
caught in the act of fishing in Hampshire
with worm would be promptly expelled
by his club. AS he would have broken the
rules, that would serve the rascal right;
but really the taboo of the worm is, like
crimes acts in the eyes of the Liberal par
ty when it is the other party which has
passed them, means of turning innocence
into wrong.
The worm in itself is inoffensive. Very
often, especially on bright summer day,
1T would be less of a failure than fly usu-
ally is, but that should not he accounted
to its discredit. The streams on which it
is forbidden are so we'll stocked that no
harm would be done, although all the fish
ermen on them tried worm now and then,
and succeeded as often and as abundantly
as their skill permitted. Successful worm
fishing in clear stream is no mean art.
1t might be rated higher than success with
the dry fly, for while it Is true that the
trout as rule prefer worm to an in
sect, 1t Is also true that to cast worm so
as to attract the fish Is much more difficult
than to place" dry fly neatly.-London
Saturday Review.
What He Was Afraid or.
In certain case which occurred not
long ago, the ordinary rule about letting