When the hook and gut is neatly tied on, as Plate I., you take a hook,
size of the above two, and a hackle to suit; you hold the hook by the
bend in the left, and opposite the barb where you see the silk hanging
at No. 1, you take a piece of tinsel, tie it on, and give two or three
turns just immediately below where you tie in the tail (see the tip of
tinsel below the tail, Plate V.), take an ostrich harl and roll it on
for tag, which you will see just above the tip of tinsel, then tie on a
topping above that, as you may see, then the piece of tinsel to rib the
body, which you may see extending longer than the tail; you now take a
piece of floss silk, fine, and form the body of it from the tail to the
shoulder, as you see the taper body of Plate V., and during the interval
tie in the hackle on the centre of the body, at the point where the silk
is hanging to receive the wings; take the end of the hackle in your
right (first roll the tinsel as the body of Plate VI.) finger and thumb,
and roll it slantingly over the body in rotation with the tinsel, as you
see in this latter plate, and tie it down at the end of the shank, leave
the silk hanging as in this plate, touch it at this place with varnish;
you may wing it with turkey or "glede" (kite's) tail feather, mallard,
&c., like the plate of the plain fly, opposite No. 7, or like the wing
of the gaudy Irish salmon fly immediately under that number at the
bottom of the plate, (I mention these two flies in this manner to
distinguish them from the plate on Salmon Hooks). These two are models
of a plain, and gaudy Irish fly; the delicacy of the body of the gaudy
one, as the silk and tinsel is so finely wrought between each joint of
harl and hackles, is beyond compare; and the wing is finely mixed,
although not so perfect as the beautiful engravings of the twelve
salmon flies.
Before I begin the gaudy salmon fly, I will here show how the palmer is
made, in two or three ways.
[Illustration: TO MAKE THE PALMER OR DOUBLE HACKLEFLY.]