SALMONIA:
OR
DAYS OF FLY FISHING.
PREFACE.
These pages formed the occupation of theAuthor during some months of severe anddangerous illness, when he was wholly incapableof attending to more useful studies,or of following more serious pursuits. Theyconstituted his amusement in many hours,which otherwise would have been unoccupiedand tedious; and they are published inthe hope, that they may possess an interestfor those persons, who derive pleasure fromthe simplest and most attainable kind ofrural sports, and who practice the art, orpatronize the objects of contemplation, ofthe Philosophical Angler.
viThe conversational manner and discursivestyle were chosen as best suited to the stateof health of the Author, who was incapableof considerable efforts and long-continued attention;and he could not but have in minda model, which has fully proved the utilityand popularity of this method of treatingthe subject—The Complete Angler, by Waltonand Cotton.
The characters, chosen to support theseConversations, are—Halieus, who is supposedto be an accomplished fly fisher;Ornither, who is to be regarded as a gentlemangenerally fond of the sports of thefield, though not a finished master of theart of angling; Poietes, who is to be consideredas an enthusiastic lover of nature,and partially acquainted with the mysteriesof fly fishing; and Physicus, who is describeduninitiated as an angler, but as aviiperson fond of inquiries in natural historyand philosophy.
These personages are of course imaginary,though the sentiments attributed to them, theAuthor may sometimes have gained from recollectionsof real conversations with friends,from whose society much of the happiness ofhis early life has been derived; and in theportrait of the character of Halieus, givenin the last dialogue, a liken