There are plenty of fishing books that a man is glad to have on his shelves, but most of them stay there, once they have been read. Major Morritt's has its place on mine, with Pritt, Tod, Edmunds and Lee and a few other favourites, but not one of the others has, over the last twenty years, left its place so often. It is the book of a general practitioner. There is no method that he has not tried, and to the use of each method he has brought an open and inquiring mind, so that the reader finds not a mere echo of what has been said by others but first hand and well considered experience. It is a book of charm. It is a book of wisdom. I think it would be impossible for any fisherman to read it without increasing both his enjoyment of fishing and his skill. For many years it has been unobtainable. My own copy of the first edition is almost worn out, and to be worn out is the highest praise that any book can win.

(Arthur Ransome, blurb on the d/w of the 2nd ed., 1950).


An entirely charming book, mainly on trout-fishing but with admirable chapters on sea-trout and salmon. No fisherman can read it without increasing both his enjoyment of fishing and his skill.

(Arthur Ransome, Fishing, 1955, p. 19).

... it may be as well to remind readers of fishing books that Major Morritt is the author of one of the best in our language. In 1929 he wrote Troutfishing: Ways and Wiles. That little book had a place on my shelf from the moment it appeared, with Pritt on Yorkshire Trout Flies, Edmonds and Lee on Brook and River Trouting and E. M. Tod on Wet Fly Fishing. But the test of a good book is that it shall not stay on its shelf, and not one of the others during the last quarter of a century has left its place so often. It went out of print and became hard to buy. My own copy, much read, and much borrowed, almost wore out. In 1950 it was republished with additional chapters as Fishing Ways and Wiles. For that new edition of one of my favourite books I happened to be partly responsible, but it did not give me all that I had asked for and during the last six years I have been, year in and year out, badgering its author to pull himself together, get his second wind and write another book. At long last he has done so ...

(Arthur Ransome in his foreword to The constant fisherman, 1957, p. 1).