Paternoster and Barbel tackle
Showery windy days are generally best for fly fishing, blowing from the south, south-west, west, and north; there are but few fish take in east winds. When the wind blows warm in the beginning of the season it is good for bait fishing, and in autumn mild days are best. In days when there is no likelihood of constant rain after clear nights, and a nice grey cloud covers the sky, with a good cool breeze blowing to ripple the water, this is the time to rise the large trout, and which afford the best sport.
"Full nature swarms with one wondrous massOf animals, or atoms organized,Waiting the vital breath, when parent heavenShall bid His spirit blow."Thomson.
FOOTNOTE:[H]Given them by the Great Author of nature.
[H]Given them by the Great Author of nature.
[H]Given them by the Great Author of nature.
WHICH AREPIG'S HAIR, MOHAIR, FUR, & HACKLES,COMMONLY CALLED DUBBING.
The great advantage the fly fisher must derive from a knowledge of dyeing his colours and hackles is obvious. It affords amusement to the enthusiastic fisher to be acquainted with the various shades required for making his flies to suit the rivers, and the flies become valuable when made of good colours and hackles. Every hackle and colour that is used for making a salmon fly must be of the richest dye imaginable, that they may show brilliant and good to the fish's eye at the bottom of the water, and entice them to rise and take it at the top. The hackles must be taken from old cocks, both the neck and saddle ones, asthey hold the dye best. Wool is not good for the fly, as it soaks the water, and is dull and heavy. Pig hair, that next the skin, with the stiff and coarse bristles picked and cleared away, and mohair, which is Spanish goat hair, a most beautiful brilliant substance for fly making when dyed well; white seal's fur, and furs of different kinds of a white colour. White hackles are best for yellows, oranges, gold colours, blues, greens, &c.; red hackles do best to dye claret, red, or fiery browns, olives, and cinnamon browns, &c., and black hackles for sooty olives, and tawny colours. When the angler sees a white old cock he should buy him to procure his hackles, or a black cock, a grey cock, and old red cocks of every hue, all of which are good for dyeing. These also must be washed in soap and hot water before being dyed, and the flue stripped off, tied in bunches (see the bunch of white hackles in the Plate of Feathers, ready for the dye) of proper sizes, and when about to be put into the dye-pot, wet them and the hair in hot water.
Provide a small crucible or earthen pot, glazed inside, with an earthen handle, to hold a quart of soft water, and before you put inyour hackles or hair, wash them well, as I said before, in soap and hot water. The five principal colours to work upon are blue, red, yellow, brown, and black. From the combination of two or more of these may be produced every shade required, from the lightest to the darkest, so that it only requires some practice, to know the different ingredients to use, to become a Dyer of Fishing Colours.
I will begin with yellow, the most useful colour in general for the gentle craft. Put your crucible on a slow fire nearly full of water, or say half full, for the first trial. Take a tea cup, and into it put a table-spoonful of the best turmeric, pour over it some warm water, and stir it well with a clean piece of fire wood; when the water begins to simmer in the pot, put in the ingredient out of the cup, and stir it well with a piece of stick; have a second crucible, about half full of soft water, and boil it, into this put two table-spoonfuls of ground alum and one tea-spoonful of crystalof tartar, while these are boiling and perfectly dissolved, put into it your hackles or hair, and boil gently for an hour or half an hour; take off your pots and enter the hackles into the yellow dye out of the liquor into which you put the alum and tartar, and boil them very slowly for an hour, taking them out at intervals to see the shade you require; if too pale you must put more turmeric in, and if too heavy in shade the next trial, put in less, and do the same with all colours till you please your own eye. When they are the proper colour, take them out and wash them in soap and hot water. Draw them evenly through your fingers in the bunch, and let them dry, as this keeps them in shape.
There are three or four ways to dye yellow by changing the stuff. Fill your pots nearly full of soft water, and put into one the tartar and alum, and into the other two or three handfuls of yellow wood, which must be boiled slowly for three or four hours; when it is well boiled, strain off the liquor from the wood into a basin, and throw the wood away; put the dyeing liquor into the pot again, and when boiling take out the hackles from the mordant of tartarand alum and put them into the yellow dye, let them boil gently for some time till the yellow colour has entered the hackles or hair, then take them out and wash them in soap and water, straighten them between the fingers, and let them dry; take them in the right hand and strike them on the fore-finger of the left till they are quite dry.
By boiling two handfuls of fustic and a table-spoonful of turmeric together, and repeating the above process, there will be produced a golden yellow, which is very good for fly making. There must not be too much alum used, neither must the ingredients be boiled too long. Persian berries, bruised and boiled slowly, with a spoonful of turmeric, produces a good yellow; and an ingredient called weld, boiled as before, and adding the alum, is a good dye for yellow,—indeed, the weld is the best dye, if care is taken with it.
Put into your dye pot about two handfuls of walnut rinds, or as much as it will hold nicely to boil; simmer this slowly over the fire forthree or four hours, and add a little water to it as it boils away. When all the juice of the dye is taken out of the rinds, strain the liquor off, put it into the basin, and throw away the rinds; you take two handfuls more and boil them in the same way, and add the stuff together in the pot; the rinds being thrown away, put your hackles, &c., previously washed, into the dye, and simmer them on the fire for four or five hours, till you have the proper colour struck on the hackles. The alum and tartar need not be added to this dye.
Take out the feathers and wash them well; the walnut roots cut small, dye in the same way.
The Saunders' Wood, brought from the Indies, and sold in powder or ground mixed with sumach is good, it takes long to boil, adding the alum.
A Cinnamon Brown or Fiery Brown may be struck on the hackles or colours (pig hair or mohair) by first dyeing them yellow, the same as explained in the yellow dye; put the hackles,previously dyed yellow, into the liquor of walnut rinds, and simmer them over the fire slowly for three or four hours, and leave them in all night, if a dark fiery brown is required; the less of the rinds produce cinnamon or yellow brown, the roots and rinds of the walnut are the best for the various shades; the rind of the alder dyed with alum and tartar is also good.
Fill your crucible three parts full of soft water, and put it on a slow fire, at the same time put in your blue ingredients, previously prepared, (this is done by dissolving the powdered blue in oil of vitriol and water in a stopper bottle for twenty-four hours). If there is a very light shade of blue required, put in a couple of table-spoonfuls of the blue ingredient, and add to it as the shade may be varied at will according to the quantity of the stuff; boil the hackles in tartar and alum, say a table-spoonful of each, or rather less of the tartar, simmer it on the fire for two or three hours according to the process mentioned before; and when the proper colouris produced take out the hackles, hair, or fur, and wash them well in soap and hot water.
There is a paste blue prepared at the dry-salters all ready for the dye pot, take a table-spoonful of it and stir it well up in your pot nearly full of soft water, and boil it gently for about an hour (or less), then put in your hackles or hair, previously washed and wet going in, boil for two hours very slowly and wash off the dye; any shade of blue may be had in a very short time by this process; there are two or three dry-salters in Long Acre where this paste blue is sold, and any of the other ingredients may be purchased at their shops, or at chymists.
Prepare your dye pot by nearly filling it with soft water; and keep it at a scalding heat when the dye stuff is put in, as it must not boil, if it is allowed to boil it becomes dull in colour; put into the dye pot a handful of finest grape madder, and simmer it slowly over the fire, stir well, and prepare the hackles or hair in the alum and red tartar liquor; after having boiledan hour slowly, take out a bunch and look at them between your eyes and the sun or light to see how they take the dye, if too pale there must be more madder added, and allow them to remain in the dye all night, simmer them slowly, next day take them out, rinse and wash them well, and allow them to dry in the air; mix a table-spoonful of cochineal with the madder.
When orange is desired take a handful of best madder and mix it with a spoonful of cochineal, boil it for an hour or two, add too a little ground red wood which requires more boiling than the madder itself; dye your hackles or stuff yellow first, and dip them into the red dye a short time, take them out and look at the shade you have; if too light allow them to remain in longer, and you will have darker shades of colour, put a little red tartar and ground alum into the dye to assist the red wood to strike on the materials, take them out and wash them in soap and hot water, and afterwards rinse them in urine which gives a lustre and softness to the stuff.
First dye the hackles or stuffs blue, and lay them to dry; then, fill the dye-pot more than half with soft water, and in the other pot prepare the tartar and alum, dip your hackles into this for a little while, and lay them on the table till you prepare the red dye; bruise a couple of table-spoonfuls of cochineal, and put them into the pot of hot soft water, boil for an hour, and put in the blue hackles, and allow them to simmer over the fire very slowly to keep them from burning; when you have the proper shade, take them out and wash them well.
Boil your hackles or hair in a tea-spoonful of alum, and nearly as much pure tartar, for an hour; bruise two table-spoonfuls of cochineal, and boil them in your clean water; take out the hackles from the alum-water, and put them into the cochineal liquor, and boil for two or three hours slowly or less, according to the shade you require; then take out the feathers and wash them well, and you will have the color desired.
Boil your hackles, &c., in a little crystal of tartar; procure two table-spoonfuls of cochineal, bruise them a little, and boil them gently over the fire for an hour or two; take the hackles you have just boiled in the tartar, and put them into the dye-pot, and simmer them slowly for some time, say half an hour; then take your "spirits of grain,"[I]and put into the dye-pot a tea-spoonful or a little more; take them out occasionally, and look at them between your eyes and the light, and when the right shade is obtained, rinse them and dry.
If you are in a hurry for scarlet, you may drop the particles of block-tin into aqua-fortis till they are dissolved, and add a little to the scarlet dye; the other is best, as it gives a more brilliant shade;—boil slow.
If the extract of bismuth is added to the red liquor of the cochineal in a small quantity, it will change it to a purple or violet colour.
FOOTNOTES:[I]Spirits of grain for scarlet,—a quarter pint of spirits of nitre, a quarter of an ounce of ammoniac, add half water in a bottle, and drop into it half an ounce of block-tin in grains till dissolved.
[I]Spirits of grain for scarlet,—a quarter pint of spirits of nitre, a quarter of an ounce of ammoniac, add half water in a bottle, and drop into it half an ounce of block-tin in grains till dissolved.
[I]Spirits of grain for scarlet,—a quarter pint of spirits of nitre, a quarter of an ounce of ammoniac, add half water in a bottle, and drop into it half an ounce of block-tin in grains till dissolved.
Boil your hackles or hair in a quarter of an ounce of alum, and the same quantity of pure tartar, an hour gently; wash them out of this, fill your dye-pot with clean water, or as much as will conveniently boil; put in an ounce of well-powdered dye stuff they call "grain," with one drachm of red arsenic, and one spoonful of burnt wine lees, this gives a lustre; wash and rinse well after boiling a short time, and the colour is good.
Boil your hackles, mohair, or fur, in alum and tartar, a quarter of an ounce of each; rinse them well, and put them into the dye-pot, with an ounce of savory, and as much green-wood as the pot will contain; (it is best to boil off the savory and green-wood first, throw away the wood, and boil the feathers in the liquor;) boil gently, and look at the feathers occasionally to see if they are the right shade, these give thenatural shades of yellow green. The quantity of tartar and alum, and of dye-stuff is given in this dye; and the preceding which will show what must be used in all shades of colour, according to the quality or your own taste.
Boil two handfuls of red-wood, or ground Brazil-wood, for an hour, with a handful of log-wood; then take a table-spoonful of oil of vitriol, and put it into half a tea cup of cold water; and when the dye-pot is a little cold, add it to the liquor, stir it, and put it on with the hackles or hair, and boil it gently for two hours; take out your material, and put it into cold water; add to the dye it comes out of a little copperas, and a small quantity of pearlashes, about the size of a nut of copperas, and a quarter that size of the ashes; put in your hackles or material again, and when the proper shade is obtained, rinse and wash well, and finish in urine, which brightens them, and your colour is good.
Take a handful of nut galls and bruise them, put them into the crucible and boil them half an hour, add to the dye a table-spoonful of oil of vitriol in half a cup of water, put in the hackles and boil two hours; then add to the liquor a little pearl ashes, and a piece of copperas the size of a nut, boil gently for two hours or as long as required to suit the taste of the dyer, rinse and wash them well, the ashes need not be used in this dye, but if used a very small quantity will suffice.
Another way:—boil red wood powdered for two hours (two handfuls), and then put the hackles in, boil an hour longer, let the liquor cool, and put into a tea cup half full of water nearly a table-spoonful of aqua-fortis and pour it into the dye, stir well occasionally and keep the hackles down, boil for two hours more and rinse off, finish in a little urine. If a very dark claret is required lay them in to boil for a day and night with a scalding heat.
Boil two good handfuls of log-wood with a little sumach and elder bark for an hour, put in the stuff or hackles (boil very gently), bruise a piece of copperas about the size of two Spanish nuts, put it in with a little argil and soda; take out the hackles and hold them in the open air a little, then put them in again and leave them all night gently heated, wash the dye well out of them and your black will be fine. The argil and soda soften the dye stuff of the copperas, but a small quantity must be put in.
The greatest nicety of all is in finding the exact quantity of ingredients to put in, so as to prevent the dye stuff from injuring the fibres of the hackles, &c.; for the light shades add the smallest quantity, and augment it by degrees. Dye the hackles a very lightshade of blue first, in prepared indigo,[J]as I said before, take a spoonful and put it into the dye pot and boil it softly for half an hour. Add a very small quantity of alum and tartar to the dye, put in your hackles, and boil for a short time; add to the dye a table-spoonful of the best turmeric, savoy, or green wood, a little of each would do best, boil slowly for an hour, take out the hackles, rinse them, and you will have a green: you may have any shade of green by dyeing the blues darker or lighter, and putting in more yellowing stuff and less blue when light yellow greens are required, boil gently, and look at the hackles often to see that they have taken the shade you want.
Boil ground logwood with bruised nut galls and a small quantity of copperas, according to judgment: you may have a pigeon dun, lead colour, light, or dark dun. The ingredientsmust be used in small quantities, according to taste. You may have raven grey, or duns of various shades, by boiling with the logwood a small quantity of alum and copperas.
FOOTNOTE:[J]Half a tea cupful of water, and the same quantity of oil of vitriol, put into a bottle, the indigo to remain in twenty-four hours to dissolve.
[J]Half a tea cupful of water, and the same quantity of oil of vitriol, put into a bottle, the indigo to remain in twenty-four hours to dissolve.
[J]Half a tea cupful of water, and the same quantity of oil of vitriol, put into a bottle, the indigo to remain in twenty-four hours to dissolve.
Dissolve some indigo in oil of vitriol for twenty-four hours, put a couple of spoonfuls in your pot, add a little crystal of tartar, put in your hackles and boil, or at least keep them at a scalding heat, or the vitriol will burn the feathers, furs, &c., take them out, rinse them well, and the colour will be lasting.
If to the above liquor some fustic chips, well boiled by themselves, and the juice added, you may then have any shade of the best green.
Boil some fenugreek and a little alum half an hour, put in the white hackles, &c., and add a little pearlash and Brazil-wood, boil them gently an hour, rinse them, and your colour will be lasting.
Boil the hackles, &c., that have been previously dyed brown, in some nut gall, sumach, and alder bark, then add a small quantity of green copperas to the liquor, allow it to remain a day and a night in water that you can bear the hand in, and all the stuff will enter the materials.
Olives are dyed from blue, red, and brown, of every shade, according to fancy.
From yellow, blue, and brown, are made olives of all kinds.
From brown, blue, and black, brown and green olives are made.
From red, yellow, and brown, are produced orange, gold colour, marigold, cinnamon, &c.
See Haigh's Dyer's Assistant of Woollen Goods, for larger quantities.
I will now add the way to dye the colours, for pighair, mohair, hackles, &c., in a concise and summary manner, to avoid giving trouble in too many words, and the quantities of ingredients I have given before, which would be superfluous to mention over so often, and which the dyer must know by this time. The great art is in knowing the quantities that each dye requires to obtain the exact colour, and this may be known by a close observation to the rules I have given.
Fustic and alum water will dye yellow, the hackles dipped three times in fresh stuff. Weld, turmeric, and fenugreek, will give a yellow, boiled in alum water, and the hackles dipped often, till they are the proper colour.
These may be dyed without tartar at pleasure.
Brazil-wood, boiled till you have a strong decoction, strain off the juice, then add alum water, boil the hackles in it slowly for a day or two, and it will produce good reds. If the colour of the Brazil-wood be very strong, theremay be reds obtained in an hour's boiling. This is a wood which is of a hard nature, and it is difficult to extract the colour from it, although a good dye.
A claret may be produced from Brazil-wood mixed with red archil, and boiled in the usual manner, dipped in potash liquor, or brilla will act in the same way to strike the colour; use hard water.
A fiery brown may be made from fustic and turmeric boiled together with alum and a little crystal of tartar, (soft water for this dye), and then dip in liquor of potash.
A cinnamon brown may be made with a little madder, or stone crottle, boiled with alum and tartar, with a little turmeric to finish it.
A good blue may be had by boiling the hackles with alum water, and add a spoonful of the liquid blue; this is done by putting some oil of vitriol into a bottle with a little water, and then the indigo, powdered, which will dissolve in twenty-four hours, and be ready for use. (I have mentioned this twice before, as I am very particular.)
For a purple, dye blue first, then add the red dye, and dip it in potash; when thehackles, &c., are left long in the red, it is more of a wine purple.
To have a good green, dye blue first, then boil in turmeric and fustic bark, with alum and tartar, as usual. You may have any shade of green by noticing the process in the dye pot.
To dye an orange, first make it a turkey red with Brazil-wood and alum water, then finish with turmeric and fustic till the colour pleases you.
To dye a golden olive, boil sumach and turmeric with alum water, add a little potash and copperas, and finish with new turmeric and a little potash.
Green olive may be made with a little more copperas and verdigris.
Sooty olive is made by adding to the first a little alder or oak bark, and finishing with turmeric and alum water.
An amber may be made with red, and finished with yellow dye; the first with stone crottle or madder, and finish with turmeric bark; the yellow with alum water. All fishing colours should be dyed yellow first with alum and crystal of tartar, but claret.
Claret may be made from Brazil-wood, barkedfirst in alum water, adding new Brazil three or four times fresh to the liquor, and simmer slowly for a day or two.
A fiery brown may be made from lima or peth-wood, barked with turmeric and alum water.
A golden yellow may be had from citrine bark, boiled in new stuff three times slowly, bark with alum, and dip in potash or brilla.
All blues may be dipped in potash, to sadden the colour.
A crottle or red orange, boil madder and stone crottle together, and bark with alum water; the madder will do if the crottle cannot be had. The crottle grows on stones in rocky places, like red moss.
An orange may be had by dyeing yellow in strong liquid three times fresh; bark with alum, and dip in potash.
A Green Drake may be made by dyeing a good yellow first, and adding a few drops of the blue decoction from the bottle of prepared blue dye, this comes to the green drake colour; add a little copperas to make a green dark or light, as you please.
A golden olive may be made by dyeing brown red hackles in fustic and a little copperas, anddipped in potashes, finished in turmeric and alum; you will have a sooty olive by adding but very little of the turmeric root.
A sooty olive may be made by dyeing black hackles in yellow first with alum water, add fresh yellow stuff three times to the dye pot, and dip them in potashes.
A wine purple may be made from light dyed blue hackles, put them in the red dye of madder, Brazil, or cochineal, and dip them twice in potashes.
Liver-coloured hackles may be had from brown red hackles, barked with alum, and boiled in Brazil-wood juice, dipped in liquor of potash.
A bright olive may be made from fustic and oak bark, adding a little turmeric and alum water.
A fiery cinnamon may be had from yellow dye, Brazil juice, and madder mixed, boil these well, and add a little turmeric with alum.
A golden crottle may be made from stone crottle and yellow dyes with turmeric and alum water. The stone crottle is best for all golden colours, but as it may not be easily got at, use madder instead; golden orange may be hadfrom the above, adding a little potashes, and boil very slowly.
A pea green may be had by dyeing yellow first, and add a few drops out of the blue dye bottle, till it comes to the shade, it may be darkened to a leek or bottle green.
A stone blue,—bark the hackle with alum, and add to the alum water as much of the prepared dye out of the bottle as will make it dark enough, this may be easily seen from the appearance of the liquor in the dye pot.
A Prussian blue is done in the same way, keeping out the indigo, and adding the Prussian blue.
Dip a red into potashes and you have a light wine purple; blue and red dye is best.
Dip a good yellow in potashes, well boiled and stir, and you will have an orange. A little tartar is good for all colours but black.
Sumach, logwood, iron liquor, and copperas, will form a black. Boil a small quantity of copperas with logwood, and it will dye gut properly.
A tawny cinnamon may be dyed from stone crottle or madder, mixed with turmeric, alum, and a little tartar, these must be gently boiled in fresh stuff, adding a little copperas.
The necessary articles used for fly making in general are as follows: Those feathers that are of a most gaudy hue are best for the wings of salmon flies, which are golden pheasant feathers, cock of the rock, the crest of the Hymalaya pheasant, the blue and yellow macaw, the scarlet macaw, red macaw, green parrot's feathers, particularly the Amazon parrot tail, the scarlet Ibis, blue king fishers, and chattern, the splendid Trogan, the Argus pheasant, the bustard, red parrot, and the Bird of Paradise; the wood-duck feathers (try the cock of the north feathers, black hackle, white body, and gold); the jungle cock; the spotted turkey, brown, light, and dark feathers; brown mallard, or wild drake; teal feathers; heron feather, black and blue; glede or kite tail feathers; grey mallard, widgeon, and shovel duck; various dyed and natural cock hackles; grousehackles; guinea hen hackles, the rump and back feathers; silver pheasant, cock and hen bird tail, wings, and body feathers; yellow toucan feathers; blue jay feathers, and the wings of the jay for trout flies; peacock feathers, off wings, tail, and body; black ostrich feathers, and the white ostrich for dyeing all colours for the heads of flies, &c., with floss silk of every shade; gold and silver twist, and plate of different sizes; pighair, mohair, furs, &c.
The materials for small trout flies are, mohair, furs of every colour, water rat, fitch, squirrel, mole's fur, hare's ears and neck furs, mouse and common rat fur, martin's fur, sable fur, black spaniel's hair off the ear, black bear's hair for tailing the drake, and all white furs dyed of various shades, such as yellow, yellow-green, gold, orange, cinnamon, light duns, &c.; starling wings, grouse feathers, snipe wings, woodcock wings, thrush and blackbird's wings, fieldfare wings, wren tails, tomtit tails, bunton lark wing, skylark wings, sparrow wings, landrail wings, water-hen wings, water-rail wings, partridge tails and hackle feathers, brown hen wings, tail, and body feathers, dun hen wings, &c.; dun cock hackles, dun hen hackles, dottrilwings and hackles, and all dun, brown, and grey feathers that can be found on every bird that flies are useful for imitating the natural insects; tying silks of every shade, yellow and orange being the favorites; hooks of sizes, and silk-worm gut.
And now to wind up the line. I humbly beg to say that if I have deceived the friends of the rod in anything, they have a right to be indifferent with my profession of friendship, and ought to retain a sensibility of my misfortune; my conscience is clear it is not so, for I know that I would deceive myself were I to think that I could do without my admirable friends of the angle—without me they could do—but I value their worth, as in hope I rest, although they say "hope told a flattering tale." I am not deceived by flattery, be it far from us; I dislike deceit. I have hid nothing; I have done my endeavours in this book to show the youths of the angle, as well as the great fly fishers, all I know about the matter so far, and as the Chinamen say, that "time and industry convert a mulberry leaf into a silk shawl," so perseverance will be the means of the fly maker's success, if he allows himself an opportunityof accomplishing that which he requires to know and to perform, and at the same time neglect not to prepare for the "coming struggle," it will be his own fault if he does not become a skilful angler, &c. I will therefore consider myself highly honoured if the young gentlemen of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, appreciate my labour, and to be enabled, by the natural genius they possess, descending from Him who visited us through the "Orient" from on high to enlighten our understandings in every good, to find out the information they desire in the perusal of these pages.
FINIS.
Transcriber's Notes:Book uses both pearl-ash and pearl ash; salmon-fly and salmon fly. Varied hyphenation was retained. Text also uses archaic spelling, "scissars".Inexplicably, the pagination of this text's front matter runs i-xi, then begins again at v for the list of plates and reviews. No pages are missing however. This was retained.Obvious punctuation errors repaired.The remaining corrections made are indicated by dotted lines under the corrections. Scroll the mouse over the word and the original text willappear.
Book uses both pearl-ash and pearl ash; salmon-fly and salmon fly. Varied hyphenation was retained. Text also uses archaic spelling, "scissars".
Inexplicably, the pagination of this text's front matter runs i-xi, then begins again at v for the list of plates and reviews. No pages are missing however. This was retained.
Obvious punctuation errors repaired.
The remaining corrections made are indicated by dotted lines under the corrections. Scroll the mouse over the word and the original text willappear.