RED, PURPLE, AMBER, AND BROWN.

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and white feathers a yellow. If a small piece of copperas be added, the latter colour will become a useful muddy yellow, darker or lighter as may be required, and approaching to a yellow-olive dun, according to the quantity of copperas used.

To dye feathers dark red and purple.. Hackles of various colours, boiled (without alum) in an infusion of logwood and Brazil-wood dust until they are as red as they can be made by this means, may be changed to a deeper red by putting them into a mixture of muriatic acid and tin, and to a purple by a warm solution of potash. As the muriatic acid is not to be saturated with tin, the solution must be made diluted. If it burns your tongue much, it will burn the feathers a little.

To dye feathers various shades of red, amber, and brown.-First boil them in the alum mordant already mentioned; secondly, boil them in an infusion of fustick strong enough to bring them to a bright yellow (about a tablespoonful to a pint of water); then boil them in a dye of madder, peach wood, or Brazil wood. To set the colour, put a few drops of dyer's spirits (i.e., nitrate of tin combined with a small quantity of salt), which may be had from a silk-dyer, into the lastmentioned dye.

To stain gut the colour of weeds, water, &c.— Make an infusion of onion coatings, as before

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GUT STAINED A WATER-COLOUR.

directed; and when quite cold, put the gut into it, and let it remain until the hue becomes as dark as required. A strong infusion of green tea will dye gut a useful colour. So will warmed writing-ink: the gut to be steeped in it a few minutes, and immediately afterwards to be washed clean in spring-water. You will obtain another good colour by steeping gut for three or four minutes in a pint of boiling water in which you have put a teaspoonful of alum, a bit of logwood the size of a hazel-nut, and a piece of copperas the size of a pea. To make your gut a watercolour, take a teaspoonful of common red ink; add to it as much soot, and about the third of a teacupful of water; let them simmer for about ten minutes; when cool, steep your line until it be stained to your fancy. This is a very good colour for the purpose, but should be applied gradually, taking out your gut frequently to examine the depth of the tint, lest it should become too dark.

THE FLIES FIT FOR EVERY MONTH.

CHAPTER V.

A MONTHLY LIST OF FLIES FOR THE SEASON.

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For Febrnary and March.

I HAVE NOT in this edition inserted so many flies as in the previous ones. I have omitted several occasional killers, and retained good ones only. I have every reason to flatter myself that the list as it now stands, amended and purified, will be found the most useful one ever laid before the angling community. The flies described in it, if properly dressed, will kill trout and grayling universally.

No. 1. Early dark dun.-Body, water-rat's or mole's fur; wings, an old cock-starling's wingfeather; legs, dark dun hackle; tail, two fibres of a dark grizzled hackle. Hook, No. 9.

No. 2. Olive fly.-Body of dark olive mohair; wings, a starling's wing-feather, to stand upright; tail, two whisks of a mottled mallard's feather; to be tipped with a lap of silver tinsel. This fly may be advantageously varied by mixing with the mohair a little yellow hare's fur, and tying on with yellow silk. Hook, as before.

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FLIES FOR FEBRUARY AND MARCH.

No. 3. The red fly.-Body of the dark red part of squirrel's fur, mixed with an equal quantity of claret-coloured mohair, showing most claret colour at the tail of the fly; to be spun on, and warped with brown silk. Wings, from a ginger-dun covert feather of the mallard's wing; legs, a claret-coloured stained hackle. Hook, Nos. 9 and 10.

No. 4. The dark hare's ear.-Body, dark fur, of the hare's ear; wings, woodcock's wing-feather, the redder the better; legs, the fur picked out at the shoulder; tail, two fibres of the brown-mottled mallard feather; small gold tip. Hook, Nos. 10

and 11.

No. 5. The hare's ear and yellow.-Body, dark hare's ear fur, and yellow mohair mixed; wings, starling's wing-feather. To be made taper in the body; fur picked out at the shoulder for legs. Hook, No. 10. Good in March and April. A general fly.

No. 6. The partridge hackle.-Body, light and dark hare's ear fur, mixed with yellow mohair, and ribbed with yellow silk; wings and legs, the brown-mottled back-feather of the partridge. Hook, Nos. 10 and 11. An excellent fly.

No. 7. The red spinner.-Body, brown silk, ribbed with fine gold twist; tail, two fibres of a red cock's hackle; wings, some transparent lightbrown feather; legs, red cock's hackle. Hook, 10.

FLIES FOR FEBRUARY AND MARCH.

95

No. 8. The furnace-fly.--Body, orange-coloured silk; wings, a fieldfare's feather; legs, a cock's furnace-hackle. A good general fly. The feather called the furnace-hackle is rather a rare one. Its outside fibres are a beautiful dark red; that portion of them next to the stem being black. It is got from a cock's neck.

No. 9. Hofland's fancy.-Body, reddish darkbrown silk; wings, woodcock's wing; legs, red hackle; tail, two strands of a red hackle. Hook, No. 10. This is a good general fly for trout and dace, particularly in the rivers near London.

No. 10. The Maltby.-Body, cinnamon-brown mohair; wings, woodcock's wing-feather; legs, small black-red hackle; tail, two fibres of the brown mallard's feather; gold tip. Hook, No. 12.

No. 11. The cuckoo dun.-Body, lightest part of water-rat's fur, mixed with yellow mohair; wings, hen pheasant's wing-feather; legs, a dun cock's hackle, with dark bars like a cuckoo's back-feather; tail, two fibres of a grizzled hackle. Hook, No. 10.

No. 12. The March-brown, or dun drake.This is, perhaps, the best fly that can be used from the middle of March to the middle of April, and sometimes up to May. It is a large, showy fly, and almost as great a favourite in March as the May-fly in May. It has various names, viz. the cob-fly, brown caughlan, and turkey-fly, and kills