The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-11-15
THE YOUNG ANGLERS CON-
 PLANT.

Why-A Fool Fly Fisherman"
 The Young Angler was exceedingly
 anxious to win out. He knew that he
 could not hold with his delicate tackle the very large trout that lay in the swiftest water or in the deepest pools,
 and that were the special game of the
 Old Angler, but he hoped to have a run
 of luck some day and to bring to net a fair proportion of the big trout he hooked, and maybe beat just once. He
 was very skilful fisherman, and had
 repeatedly, when fishing with bis
 father, caught more pounds of trout
 than the old gentleman had caught,
 but never on any occasion, had he
 been able to equal his fathers catch
 for siege of fish. I he could only for
 one evening sit among the other fishermen at the supper table of the little mountain hotel where they made their headquarters on their fishing trip and be able to crow little over the
 Old Angler, 1t would make up for good many hours of secret chagrin.
 The Old Angler fished with a minow
 and caught only the largest trout He had a sort of half-concealed contempt for fiy-fishernan who hooked little trout, and who led them around. as he said, with a reel and Timber rod. and finally scooped them up with a. net He had never f1shed with a reel, and when he hooked a trout less than a foot long on his trout rigging, he threw lit out; and if less than fifteen inches long, he lowed it out. "Prying them out with lift the Young Angler styled it. It was only very large trout that he condescended to fool away any time with. The merry twinkle in his sharp, old gray eyes, his own inyari- able success as an angler, and his shreWd comments on fishing that yield ed only small trout made him a won- defully entertaining but not always pleasant companion for a fishing trip. For years he had held the seasons re- cord for large trout, and he would not | yield it now if he could possibly help it, especially to a fly-fsherman. His fondness for the fy-fisherman would not alter the case one bit Some men are captains of finance, and others great statesmen, but the Old Angler laid his sole claim to posterity on his lrecord of having caught more big trout
 than had ever been caught by any other man in the State. He was getting pretty we'll on in years now, and each
 season saw him more ambitious than ever to be reckoned with when records
 were being made.
 The four days trip was nearly over, and the Young Angler was still be- hind, The last afternoon had come, and he must win out in the next six
 hours or permit the Old Angler to
 wear the laurels of another season. All
 through the trip fortune had favored
 the Old Angler until his confident and
 aggressive air or superiority had be-
 come almost unbearable. If the Young
 Angler could end up the trip which
 was the last one of the season, with record breaking catch, life would not have been spent in vain
 It was a perfect afternoon for fly fishing. There had been several sharp
 dashes of rain during the morning, but
 by midday the rain had subsided to
 soft drizzle There was no wind and
 the punches of white fog hung almost
 motionless in the hollows and against the deep green of the mountain sides, There were no natural flies on the wa
 ter, and the Young Angler expected
 the trout to rise greedily. The dark
 day would make it possible for him
 to use his largest and brighest flies,
 and so increase his chances not only
 of rising big trout, but of holding them. when hooked The water under the low, heavy cloud was almost black and seemed to extend anglers an invitation to seek for prizes in It's depths
 After comfortable dinner, a boy from the hotel took the Young Angler down the road in the blackboard and left him at Lewis Rifle. This is really more than a fiffle; it is a rapid as is most of the swift water in this great stream that comes down from among the mountains in the north, and that has been a famous trout stream since the time of the Indians occupation of the country. The rifle is more than a
 hundred yards long, and where, the wa ter runs swiftly over the uneven rocky bottom, it rises and falls in pillows nearly foot high. The Young Angler found it stiff wading to cross the head of the rifle and get to the little beach on the edge of the long eddy that is al- ways found on one side or the other of such water He began to fish at the l very top of the rifle, casting diagonal | ly achOss the stream, so that the cur rent swept his flies down and back on taut line. He had worked two thirds of the rifle, thoroughly, when a brown trout fully twenty inches long and 1 half a foot broad rose and took the dropper fly that had been bouncing i from crest to crest like a live insect just starting to fly. The trout rose in to the very top of the pillow, and the 1 Young Angler could see its color and size as plainly as through plate glass. When hooked it sank to the bottom and then came so swiftly up stream that the angler could not take in line fast
 enough and in ten seconds it was loose, But then the water was so swift and the fish so enormous that he never
 could have held it anyway, and he was
 thankful to save his tackle. He finish
 ed the hiffie with three ten-inch trout
 to the good.
 At the Mountain Hole current run
 ming smoothly and rapidly as through
 the chute in a dam-ploughs its way in- l to the head of a large circmlar pool. A