Nope, it's from the Compleat Angler indeed, just from Charles Cotton's extended edition, part II, chapter VII:
"But the drake will mount steeple-high into the air; though he is to be found upon flags and grass too, and, indeed, everywhere high and low near the river; there being so many of them in their season, as, were they not a very inoffensive insect, would look like a plague: and these drakes (since I forgot to tell you before, I will tell you here) are taken by the fish to that incredible degree, that, upon a calm day, you shall see the still-deeps continually all over circles by the fishes rising, who will gorge themselves with those flies, till they purge again out of their gill; and the trouts are at that time so lusty and strong, that one of eight or ten inches long will then more struggle and tug, and more endanger your tackle, than one twice as big in winter: but pardon this digression. "
Gotta love those run on sentences; that's where I get my habit of semicolons, dashes, commas, and so on. Too much classical literature.
It's slightly mistranscribed in the 1913, height for high, which is probably why you didn't catch it in google the first time around.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2007-01-07 06:26 am (UTC)"But the drake will mount steeple-high into the air; though he is to be found upon flags and grass too, and, indeed, everywhere high and low near the river; there being so many of them in their season, as, were they not a very inoffensive insect, would look like a plague: and these drakes (since I forgot to tell you before, I will tell you here) are taken by the fish to that incredible degree, that, upon a calm day, you shall see the still-deeps continually all over circles by the fishes rising, who will gorge themselves with those flies, till they purge again out of their gill; and the trouts are at that time so lusty and strong, that one of eight or ten inches long will then more struggle and tug, and more endanger your tackle, than one twice as big in winter: but pardon this digression. "
Gotta love those run on sentences; that's where I get my habit of semicolons, dashes, commas, and so on. Too much classical literature.
It's slightly mistranscribed in the 1913, height for high, which is probably why you didn't catch it in google the first time around.
Fun hot story!