Q.—If there is not sufficient mohair twisted on the silk to form the whole body, what must be done?
A.—When the mohair on the silk becomes short, I tie it down on the centre of the shank, and tie in the point of the hackle here (see the second and third flies in the plate of this process), and apply a little more stuff to fill the shoulder, leaving a little of the hook to receive the wings.
Q.—Having tied the hackle on towards the shoulder of the fly, how do you strike it in its proper place?
A.—I hold the hook in my left hand by the bend, and with the right take hold of the stem of the hackle and roll it round the shank on its back, and tie it down (the fly may be ribbed and hackled from the tail like the fourth fly in the plate).
Q.—The hackle, body, tail, and tinsel now neatly tied, how do you tie on the wings?
A.—I now hold the fly in my left hand by the body, drawing the fibres underneath my finger and thumb out of the way, lay on the wings double, catch them under the nails of the left and give two laps of the tying silk over them, press them down at this place with the right nail divide and let the fibres of the hackle spring up between them, cut off the roots, lap the silk closely over the head and fasten with two knots (see the cock tail at the bottom of this plate).
Note.—The wings of this fly were tied on first, as seen, and turned up last; the fuller the fly is at the shoulder the more the wings will stand upright on the back, and it often occurs that when the wings of the fly lie flat on the back, and it happens to be an end fly on the casting line, which is usually under the surface of the water, that the fish takes it for a drowned fly eagerly, and the wings much longer than the bend of the hook, this is not unnatural, as the wings of numbers of the brown and olive flies seen on the water have their wings much longer than the body, and when not on the wing lie flat on their backs.
I will here give a more easy way of making a Trout fly.
Q.—How do you commence to make the Fly in this way?
A.—I tie on the wings first, turn them up, tie down the head, and finish the fly at the tail.