Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 2.djvu/46

36 hook or spring swivel to loop the tackle and bait on. This bait is then dropped into holes between the weeds or rushes, and is worked up and down by the lifting and fallin- of the rod-point, the lead within the bait causing it to shoot and dart along as though the fish were alive. When a pike seizes it, ten minutes must be allowed for him to pouch, when the angler must strike firmly, hold on, and get his fish out as well as he can. It is by no means the pleasantest method of fishing, as the waiting is tedious. The fish constantly runs the line foul of the weeds, &c. ; and often, after a tedious waiting, it is found that the fish has rejected the bait after all. Added to these, there is this objection to all gorge fishing, that the angler must kill every fish he catches, as the hooks are in the fish s throat, and small under-sized fish, which ought to be returned to the water, are sacrificed, as well as fair takeable ones.

Sometimes grubs and worms are used in mid-water fish ing, being cast up stream and allowed to float down in mid- water. This is chiefly for trout. The angler uses a long, light bamboo rod, and a single shot for a sinker. Two small worms are generally used ; the brandling or gilt-tail is more frequently used (a worm found in rotten manure, &c.) Some use a single hook, some three small hooks tied one above the other. This is called " the Stewart tackle," after the author of the Practical Angler ; and the worms are twined round and impaled on them. Wading up stream, the angler casts before him into every likely stream and eddy, allowing the line and bait to come down towards him in mid-water, and striking the moment he perceives a check. This is a very killing plan, and is adopted with a modification of tackle, to fish with beetles, larvae, palmers, and, in fact, almost any kind of insect ; for the trout is a very omnivorous fish, and will hardly refuse anything that is small enough. The lure is cast overhand, as in fly-fishing, and practice enables the angler to cast nearly twice the length of the rod.

Surface or Fly Fishing.

This method of fishing is conducted with the natural or the artificial fly. The first of these ways is called daping, dibbing, or shade fishing, and consists of iising a long light rod with almost 2 yards of fine strong gut, to the end of which is tied a No. 7 or 8 hook, not too coarse in the wire. A fly, beetle, or insect of some kind is then put on the hook by transfixing the thorax of the insect. Then the angler, having watched the fish rising under some bank or projecting tree or bush, creeps very softly to the place, and, keeping himself out of sight, pokes the point of his rod through some open^spot in the bushes, and allows the insect to drop on the surface, just over or a little above the spot where the fish he wants to catch has been rising. Probably he will not be able to see or to feel the fish rise, and he will have to trust to a third sense his hearing. He will hear a slight " plop," like a bubble coming out of a sub merged glass. A gentle strike then is required, and a tight hand on the fish, as such places are usually near old roots or boughs, in which the fish will try to shelter him self and entangle the tackle. The best fish are frequently taken in this way. Another method of using the natural fly or insect is by casting it. In this case a single-hand fly-rod is used, and it requires great care to avoid whipping the insect off the hook. Having cast the bait to the extent required, the line and bait rest on the surface, and the bait floats down quite naturally unchecked, and the fish rise at it in the ordinary manner. What is called the blow- line is another favourite method of using the live fly. A length of light floss silk is fastened on to the running line with about 2 feet of fine gut and a light hook at the end. Baiting the hook with a fly, the angler turns his back to the wind, holds the rod (a long light cane one) upright, allows the wind to blow the light floss line as far out as it will go, when he gradually lowers the rod and guides the fly till it touches the water a yard above a fish, when he floats over it. A little wind is required for this kind of fishing. Some insects, beetles, creepers, or larvae of the stone-fly, &c., are used in mid- water, as already noted. A word or two as to the method : a couple of shots being fixed on the line, the bait is cast with an underhand swing, as in minnow fishing, up stream, and allowed to travel down towards where the angler stands. At every stop or check of the line it is necessary to strike, for the bait being tender, whether it be a twig, mud, or fish that arrests it, it will be spoilt ; therefore the angler must always strike on every suspicion of a bite. For full particulars of this kind of fishing, as well as for all relating to trouting in the North British streams, the angler cannot do better than get The Practical Angler, by the late Mr Stewart, one of the best works ever published on such subjects. The best flies used for live-fly fishing are the large ones, as the green and grey drake, the stone fly, known often in Scotland as the May-fly, the big alder, the blue-bottle, and, in deed, any that are large enough. In casting them the angler must be careful to let his line make rather a sweep or circuit behind him, or he will easily flick off or destroy his bait. In using the artificial fly the angler employs either a single or a double handed rod, generally he com mences his apprenticeship with a single one. This is usually made either of hickory, green-heart, or split bam boo tied and glued up in lengths, runs from 10 to 12 feet long, and is tolerably pliant, more or less so, according to the taste of the angler. The linfi used is generally twisted or plaited hair and silk, or fine dressed silk. The first is the lightest. A piece of gut, knotted together until it is about 3 yards long, is termed the cast ing-line, point, lash, or collar. This is fastened to the end of the reel or running-line, and to the other end of it is looped on an artificial fly. Sometimes two or more flies are used; in this case they are called droppers or bob flies, and are looped or tied on to the casting-line about 18 inches or 2 feet apart. The end fly is called the tail or stretcher. The best way of fastening on the drop flies is to whip the gut round with silk a few times, just above one of the knots, to prevent chafing ; then take a fly with only about 5 inches of gut to it, tie a knot at the extreme end of the gut, and then knot on it once or twice, if required, over the whipped silk, and if the gut be moistened and drawn tight to the knot, even when only once knotted, it rarely slips, and the more it is pulled of course the tighter it gets. When it is desired to take the dropper off, a sharp knife slips off the extreme end knot, and the tie comes off easily. The loss of gut is infinitesi mal, and the fly w r ears out before the gut is materially shortened. The angler having his rod and line ready, and his cast of flies selected, begins by letting out a little more line than the length of his rod, waves the rod back over his right shoulder, so as to extend the line behind him, and then, making a slight curve, impels it forward towards the point he desires to reach, letting it fall on the water as lightly as possible ; then he allows his flies to float down the stream as far as they will go, when he draws out and repeats the cast, lengthening out line as he does so until he has as much out as he requires, or can cast comfortably. If in casting he does not make a curve with the rod-point behind him, but returns the line too directly, he will crack his fly off, or so crack the gut at the head of the fly that the first good fish will carry it away. When the angler sees a fish rise at his fly, if he is fishing for small fish, he cannot strike too quickly, if for large ones, he may be a little more leisurely. In fishing over a 