Part 3

Do you know the blackened timber--do you know that racing stream With the raw right-angled log-jam at the end: And the bar of sun-warmed shingle where a man may bask and dream To the click of shod canoe poles round the bend? It is there that we are going with our rods and reels and traces, To a silent smoky Indian that we know-- To a couch of new-pulled hemlock with the starlight on our faces, For the Red Gods call us out and we must go! The Feet of the Young Men--Kipling.

A CHAPTER ON TROUT FLIES

"Thyse ben xij. flyes wyth whytch ye shall angle to ye trought and graylling, and dubbe lyke as ye shall now hear me tell." Dame Juliana Berners.

FIVE centuries have passed since the dignified and devout prioress of St. Albans indited the above sentence, and the tribute to the sterling good sense therein is that the growing years have but added to its authority. A dozen well selected varieties of flies, dubbe them how ye lyke, are well-nigh sufficient for any locality. There may be streams that require a wider range of choice, but these are so rare that they may safely be considered as exceptional. Not that any particular harm has resulted from the unreasonable increase in the number and varieties of artificial flies. They amuse and gratify the tyro and in no wise disturb the master of the art. But an over-plethoric fly book in the possession of a stranger will, with the knowing, place the angling ability of the owner under suspicion. Better a thousand-fold, are the single half-dozen flies the uses and seasons of which are fully understood than a multitude of meaningless creations.

The angler should strive to attain an intelligent understanding of the principal features of the artificial fly and how a change in the form and color of these features affects the behavior of the fish for which he angles. In studying this matter men have gone down in diving suits that they might better see the fly as it appeared when presented to the fish, and there is nothing in their reports to encourage extremely fine niceties in fly-dressing. One may know a great deal of artists and their work and yet truly know but little of the value of art itself; or have been a great reader of economics, and yet have little practical knowledge of that complex product of society called civilization. So, I had rather possess the knowledge a dear friend of mine has of Dickens, Shakespeare, and the Bible alone than to be able to discuss "literature" in general before clubs and societies.

Several years of angling experience in the far west have convinced the writer that flies of full bodies and positive colors are the most killing, and that the palmers are slightly better than the hackles. Of the standard patterns of flies the most successful are the coachman, royal coachman, black hackle, Parmacheene Belle, with the silver doctor for lake fishing, in the order named. The trout here, with the exception of those in Lake Yellowstone, are fairly vigorous fighters, and it is important that your tackle should be strong and sure rather than elegant.

With a view of determining whether it were possible to make a fly that would answer nearly all the needs of the mountain fisherman, I began, in 1897, a series of experiments in fly-tying that continued over a period of five years. The result is the production of what is widely known in the west as the Pitcher fly. As before indicated, this fly did not spring full panoplied into being, but was evolved from standard types by gradual modifications. The body is a furnace hackle, tied palmer; tail of barred wood-duck feather; wing snow-white, to which is added a blue cheek. The name, "Pitcher," was given to it as a compliment to Major John Pitcher, who, as acting superintendent of the Yellowstone National Park, has done much to improve the quality of the fishing in these streams.

From a dozen states anglers have written testifying to the killing qualities of the Pitcher Fly, and the extracts following show that its success is not confined to any locality nor to any single species of trout:

"The Pitcher flies you gave me have aided me in filling my twenty-pound basket three times in the last three weeks. Have had the best sport this season I have ever enjoyed on the Coeur d'Alene waters, and I can truthfully say I owe it all to the Pitcher fly and its designer."

E. R. DENNY, Wallace, Idaho.

Photo by N. H. Darton]

"One afternoon I had put up my rod and strolled down to the river where one of our party was whipping a pool of the Big Hole, trying to induce a fish to strike. He said: 'There's an old villain in there; he wants to strike but can't make up his mind to do it.' I said: 'I have a fly that will make him strike,' and as I had my book in my pocket I handed him a No. 8 Pitcher. He made two casts and hooked a beautiful trout, that weighed nineteen ounces, down. I regard the Pitcher as the best killer in my book."

J. E. MONROE, Dillon, Montana.

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"I determined to follow the stream up into the mountains, but as I neared the woods at the upper end of the meadow I stopped to cast into a long, straight reach of the river where the breeze from the ocean was rippling the surface of the stream. The grassy bank rose steep behind me and only a little fringe of wild roses partly concealed me from the water. I cast the Pitcher flies you gave me well out on the rough water, allowed them to sink a hand-breadth, and at the first movement of the line I saw that heart-expanding flash of a broad silver side gleaming from the clear depths. The trout fastened on savagely, and as he was coming my way, I assisted his momentum with all the spring of the rod, and he came flying out into the clean, fresh grass of the meadow behind me. It was a half-pound speckled brook trout. I did not stop to pouch him, but cast again. In a moment I was fast to another such, and again I sprung him bodily out, glistening like a silver ingot, to where his brother lay. In my first twelve casts I took ten such fish, all from ten to twelve inches long, mostly without any playing. I took twenty-two fine fish without missing one strike, and landed every one safely. I was not an hour in taking the lot. Then oddly enough, I whipped the water for fifty yards without another rise. Satisfied that the circus was over, I climbed up into the meadow and gathered the spoils into my basket. Nearly all were brook trout, but two or three silvery salmon trout among them had struck quite as gamely. I had such a weight of fish as I never took before on the Nekanicum in our most fortunate fishing."

* * * * *

"Walking back along the trail, I came again to the long reach where I had my luck an hour before, and cast again to see if there might be another fish. Two silver glints shone up through the waves in the same instant. I struck one of the two fish, though I might have had both if I had left the flies unmoved the fraction of a second. Three times I refused such doublets, for I had not changed an inch of tackle, and scarcely even looked the casting line over. It was no time to allow two good fish to go raking that populous pool. However I did take chances with one doublet. So out of the same lucky spot on my return, I took ten more fish each about a foot long. I brought nearly every one flying out as I struck him, and I never put such a merciless strain on a rod before.

Photo by John Gill]

"I had concluded again that the new tenantry had all been evicted, and was casting 'most extended' trying the powers of the rod and reaching, I should say, sixty feet out. As the flies came half-way in and I was just about snatching them out for a long back cast, the father of the family soared after them in a gleaming arc. He missed by not three inches and bored his way straight down into the depths of the clear green water. 'My heart went out to him,' as our friend Wells said, but coaxing was in vain. I tried them above and below, sinking the flies deeply, or dropping them airily upon the waves, but to no purpose. I had the comforting thought that we may pick him up when you are here this summer."

JOHN GILL, Portland, Oregon.

THE BONNY RED HECKLE

Away frae the smoke an' the smother, Away frae the crush o' the thrang! Away frae the labour an' pother That have fettered our freedom sae lang! For the May's i' full bloom i' the hedges And the laverock's aloft i' the blue, An' the south wind sings low i' the sedges, By haughs that are silvery wi' dew. Up, angler, off wi' each shackle! Up, gad and gaff, and awa'! Cry 'Hurrah for the canny red heckle, The heckle that tackled them a'!'

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Then back to the smoke and the smother, The uproar and crush o' the thrang; An' back to the labour and pother, But happy and hearty and strang. Wi' a braw light o' mountain and muirland, Outflashing frae forehead and e'e, Wi' a blessing flung back to the norland, An' a thousand, dear Coquet, to thee! As again we resume the old shackle, Our gad an' our gaff stowed awa', An'--goodbye to the canny 'red heckle,' The heckle that tackled them a'!' --From "The Lay of the Lea." By Thomas Westwood.

NOTE--I am indebted to Mrs. Mary Orvis Marbury, author of "Favorite Flies," for copies of "Hey for Coquet," and "Farewell to Coquet," from the former of which the foregoing are extracts.

GRIZZLY LAKE AND LAKE ROSE

"And best of all, through twilight's calm The hermit-thrush repeats his psalm." Henry Van Dyke

GRIZZLY LAKE lies secluded among the timbered hills, four miles south--south and west--from Willow Park. The long narrow bed of the lake was furrowed by a glacier that once debouched here from the mountains to the west, and through the gravel and detritus that surround it the melting snows and rain are filtered till the water is fit for the Olympian deities. No more profitable place can be found for the angler to visit. The lake swarms with brook trout weighing from one to five pounds, and in the ice-cold water which is supplied with an abundance of insect and crustacean food the fish are in prime condition after July first. The best fishing is at the southern end, near where Straight Creek enters the lake. A little investigation will discover close at hand, several large springs that flow into the lake at this point, and here the trout congregate after the spawning season.