Salmon flies are much more carefully and artistically ‘dressed’ now than they were in former times. The gayest and the grayest of birds are hunted down to supply feathers for this purpose—gold and silver pheasants, the bustards and jungle-cocks of India, the ostrich of Africa, the wood-ducks of North America, the great owls and hawks of equatorial and arctic regions, peacocks, guinea-fowls, chanticleers and drakes of the poultry-yard, and above all turkeys, brown, gray, and white, often carefully bred to colour for this particular purpose—all are made subservient to the salmon angler’s thirst for fine feathers. The cost of materials seems of small account, two or three guineas being frequently given for a fine skin of the golden pheasant. Hooks, though finer made and of better steel, are not very different in shape from those in use some two thousand years ago, as may be seen in those got from Pompeii, now in the museum at Naples. But in variety of fine feathers, in silks and wools of wondrous dyes, in gold and silver tinsels, and in the great manipulating skill now devoted to the production of salmon flies, there must have been advances. Many of these lures are jewel-like enough to be worn as bonnet and dress ornaments by ladies of fashion; and looking into a well-stocked angling book, one cannot but conclude that any salmon knowing a good thing could not fail to jump at some of the dazzling beauties got up for the delectation of its kind. Certainly many anglers, doting over their favourites, feel that if they were salmon, this or that ‘grand fly’ would be irresistible. We have heard an old enthusiast assert, as he hurried into a favourite pool, that he had on ‘a hook this morning that a fish canna lie below.’ And yet the fastidiousness of the fish seems to keep pace with the advances of the angler’s art and knowledge. Salmon see more hooks and lines, and possibly get to know them better; and so all the fine rods, reels, lines, and lures do not insure even the raising of a salmon, be the day and the river never so promising and the angler charming never so wisely. To an outsider, it must often be a huge joke to see a party of salmon anglers mounted cap-à-pie with such a wealth of fishing paraphernalia—silver-mounted rods and reels, creels of vast dimensions, waterproof coats, wading boots and ‘breeks,’ luncheon-bags and landing-nets equally capacious, and great telescopic-mounted gaffs of glittering steel and brass, formidable-looking enough to grapple a seal—marching down the glen with their gillies in the morning; and marching back again at night without having turned a scale on a salmon’s back, though the fish were tumbling about the pools like porpoises, and so plentiful, that had Donald only thrown in the big gaff, he could hardly have failed to hook a thumper in hauling it back again.