STEWART ON THE WET FLY: LESSONS FROM A MASTER TACTICIAN. Selected and introduced by Paul Schullery.

2008 1st edition thus. 16mo (105 x 159mm). Pp114. B/w illustrations taken from old engravings, brief bibliography, black, decoratively grained end-papers. Powder-blue, decoratively grained paper-covered boards, spine titled in gilt.

A carefully re-edited version of William Stewart's The Practical Angler: or the Art of Trout Fishing, More Particularly Applied to Clear Water. Since this series deals exclusively with flyfishing, the "chapters on equipment, worm, natural mayfly and minnow fishing and loch fishing have been omitted from this sampler as falling outside the scope of this series." In addition, this edition omits the plates of flies included in the original edition. "William Stewart's writings burst upon the angling world in 1857 in a flurry of acclaim and controversy. Stewart aimed to reshape the angling habits of his day. His forceful arguments on behalf of upstream fishing and his advocacy of shorter, stiffer fly rods were an important influence in the rise of dry-fly fishing. ...Many of the rationales behind practices that we take for granted today were first and best expressed by Stewart." The publishers claim this to be the first American edition of The Practical Angler.