Any assertion or suggestion that these wools and feathers were used, and are specially stated to have been used for tying only the Macedonian fly, and that this special statement of such uses is meant expressly to differentiate the Macedonian from all other ways of fishing, and thus constitutes the first mention of an Artificial Fly, I counter by a couple of queries. Why in XII. 43, and XV. 10, are these self-same wools and feathers set out among the necessary ordinary requisite tackle of a fisherman, if they were not used for dressing a fly, perhaps more primitive but still Artificial? And, if they were not so used, to what other fishing purpose can they be fairly applied? Again, let us for a moment grant that the Macedonian device was the absolutely new invention or the striking departure from all preceding angling methods, which, had artificial flies not previously been well known, it most certainly would have been. In this case, surely Ælian, meticulous in his examination and classification of the tackle, etc., needed for each of the four stated kinds of fishing, would have employed, when about to tell of this invention, words calling more instant attention to and far worthier of this great revolution than the simple, “I have heard of the Macedonian way of fishing, and it is this”! As supporting my contention, a further point must be noted. In the list of tackle in XII. 43, wools and feathers are mentioned in a general manner, but in XV. 1, their use is particularised and elaborated. Similarly in the first passage the making and material of Rods are given, but in the second (and here only) the particular length of rod is stated. It is on these passages (XII. 43, and XV. 10) and on their natural implication, that I chiefly found my conclusion that (A) the practice of making up and fishing with some kind of artificial fly had been in more or less general use for a long time previous to the Macedonian device, and (B) that the device is quoted merely as an instance of a special, local, and improved adaptation of such usage—in a word as _le dernier cri_ in flies![436] If in Martial (_Ep._, V. 18. 8) _musco_, not _musca_, should be read, then to Ælian would belong the credit of being the first to mention not only the use of the artificial fly, but also the use of the natural fly. In XIV. 22, we read of the _Thymalus_ (a kind of grayling), which alone of all fishes gives out after capture no fishy smell, but rather so fragrant an odour that one would almost swear that in his hand he held a freshly gathered bunch of thyme (“that herb so beloved by bees”), instead of a fish. Ælian then lays down that, while it is easy to catch this fish in nets, it is impossible to do so with a hook baited with _anything_ except the κώνωψ, _i.e._ the gnat, or more probably from the vivid description by one who has evidently suffered, the mosquito, “that horrid insect, a foe to man, both day and night, alike with his bite and his buzz.”[437]