Hiini :Hi > : !>: /' .) ! l W it ill liilHi lliil B II M ill j^w^-;?;^----^;:-: ;;< fj IE R K f If V LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIfOtNIA er HINTS ON ANGLING. LONDOW : PRINTED BY J. WERTHEIKER AKD CO., CIRCUS PLACE, FINSBUET CIRCUS. HINTS ON ANGLING, WITH SUGGESTIONS FOR ANGLING EXCURSIONS IN FRANCE AND BELGIUM, TO WHICH ARE APPENDED SOME BRIEF NOTICES OF THE Srotttef), and !-n$i) PALMER HACKLE, ESQ. " When wiUi his lively ray tlie potent Sun Has pierced the streams anil roused the tinny rc<-, Then, rising cheerful, to thy sport repair; Chief should the western breezes curling: play, And light on ether bear the shadowy cloud*."-THOMPsnx. LONDON: W. W. ROBINSON, 69, FLEET STREET. M.DCCC.XLVI. TO THE YOUNG ANGLEKS OF ENGLAND, (A NOBLE AND ADVENTUROUS RACE,) ?"l)c follotomg ARE RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED, BY THE AUTHOR. M842721 CONTENTS. Page PREFACE . ix INTRODUCTION i PART I. DESCRIPTION OF FISH - - 31 The Salmon - - Trout 36 Pike 44 Perch 49 - Carp 50 Tench - 55 - Barbel 57 Bream - 59 Chub 61 Roach 63 Dace 65 Gudgeon - 66 - Bleak 67 - Pope or Ruffe 68 Eel 69 - Lamprey - - : 76 - Char 77 - Loach - 78 Minnow - 79 Smelt The Stickleback The Flounder - 80 PART II. MATERIALS FOR ANGLING 83 Fishing Rods 86 Lines 87 Vlll CONTENTS. Pago. MATERIALS FOR ANGLING (continued), Fish-Hooks - 88 Fishing Floats 89 Landing-Nets and Gaff The Method of Making Flies 90 The Palmer or Hackle Fly 94 BAITS, ETC. 95 Bait for Salmon Trout - 103 Flies for France and Belgium - 108 Great Britain and Ireland 109 Trolling for Trout 115 Worm-Fishing for Trout 119 Fishing for Pike 122 Bait for Perch 137 Carp - 140 Tench 143 Barbel 144 Chub - 146 Bream 148 Koach - 150 Gudgeon 152 Dace 155 Bleak - 156 Eels - 158 Ruffe - 161 Minnow PAKT III. FEANCE AND BELGIUM 163 THE PAS DE CALAIS 174 Calais Boulogne 176 Gravelines - 178 Dunkerque - 179 Bergues 181 St. Omer 182 The River Aa 184 Aire - 191 Lillers 192 Bethune 193 Souchez 194 Armentieres Therouanne - 196 Arras ..... 200 CONTENTS. ix Page. FRANCE (continued), Bapaume ----- 202 St. Pol - - 205 Hesdin - - Montreuil - - - 209 Etaples - THE SOMME 213 The River Authie Somme 214 Dieppe 217 NORMANDY AND BRITTANY 219 Pont Audemer Pont L'Eveque - - 220 Caen - - St. Lo '221 Coutances - Avranches - - 222 St. Malo Lannion 223 Pontivy 224 Rennes .... Tributary Rivers of the Loire which take their rise in Normandy - 224 THE LOIRE - - 226 The River Loire and the Tributary Streams on its Southern and North-Eastern Banks RlVERS BETWEEN THE LOIRE AND THE GARONNE 240 THE GARONNE AND ITS TRIBUTARIES 244 THE ADOUR - - 250 THE RHONE 254 THE SAONE - - - - 255 THE MARNE, ETC. 264 The Seine - 265 - Marne - 169 Oise ----- THE MEUSE, ETC., 276 TheMeuse Moselle - 279 Sambre - - 280 THE SCHELDT, ETC., 281 BELGIUM - 283 Ostende Bruges Gand 286 M, -I lines or Mechlin - - - - 285 X CONTENTS. Page BELGIUM (continued), Brussels 286 Termonde - 288 Louvain Tirlemoiit 290 Liege ------ Namur 291 Dinant 292 PART IV. ENGLAND AND WALES, SCOTLAND AND IRELAND - 293 ENGLAND AND WALES The Thames - 297 Lea - 298 Colne - 299 Wandle - Cray - Fishing Rivers of England - 308 Principal Rivers of North Wales - 310 South Wales 311 SCOTLAND Rivers of Scotland - 317 Lakes IRELAND - 320 Rivers of Ireland ... 322 Principal Lakes - 330 POETRY. The early sun is rising fair and bright 29 The greedy pike lies basking cool 132 Vale of Bliss ! what joy to wander 190 Awake, awake, the May-morn sun 198 When this old rod was new - 305 APPENDIX. No. I. LEGAL ENACTMENTS IN FRANCE 325 No. II. SALMON FISHERIES - - - 333 No. III. COMPARATIVE SCALE OF MEASUREMENTS IN 335 ENGLAND AND FRANCE PREFACE. GENTLE reader, let us have a quiet tete-a-tete with you for a few short minutes. We take you, like an old and tried friend, by the button of your coat, and coolly lead you into our small sanctum, to tell you our private notions, and thoughts, and fancies, concerning this little work of ours, which we entreat you to read, and of course advise you to buy. Now, don't tidget about, pray ; but seat your- self snugly in an author's easy chair, and listen with partial patience, if you please, to our light gossip. After .all, you must allow there is nothing like a quiet private confab with a dear and kind friend. Scarcely anything can excel few merely social matters can equal the truthful Xll PREFACE. concord of warm hearts and full heads ; the kind sidelong turning up of the patient anxious ear; the gentle half-whisper of smiling consent and regard; whilst all the time the merry fire is blazing and crackling with the brisk clearness of a frosty season ; the candles are shining brightly, the windows closely shut; the bottles and glasses sparkling on the table; the kettle bubbling and singing, and steaming on the hob ; and, in short everything seeniing to urge the cosey settlers, in such a pleasant and happy fix, to do nothing but " talk talk talk." Well, we have been rambling up and down in France and Belgium for many years ; with our rod in our hand, and fishing-basket on our back, dropping a line in this canal, or that river, and throwing the light fly on the surface of yon pebbly stream ; some days sporting with the bright tiny bleak; on others with the greedy pike ; and ofttimes with the dazzling salmon and the playful trout. We have trudged over hill and dale, mountain and valley, and through city and village, with great glee and some profit, both to our bodily frame and mental powers; and PREFACE. Xlll dreaming that every human being who is worth his salt should be an angler ; we have bethought ourselves that we might venture, without even the show of pride, to take upon ourselves the task of telling the world the result of our ram- bles. We have no vain object to serve ; no latent spirit of envy to appease; no sordid purpose to answer. We have a warm feeling towards all writers on angling, both ancient and modern ; and our only desire is that the world will not think us too bold and proud, if we presume to throw our own sayings and doings and gleanings, into the common stock of angling, knowledge, and peaceful pleasure. \Ve confess we feel a great deal of bashful shyness, in thus doffing our cap in the face of the great names who have gone before us as authors on rod-fishing; but still we take courage from the thought, that there is more of the true milk of human kindness in the veins of anglers, than in those of any other class of human beings. W T hat errors, therefore, either of language, plan, notion, or feeling we may have fallen into, will, we trust, be kindly and fairly passed over, as XIV PREFACE. things that belong to our very nature as human and erring creatures. The world, now-a-days, seems all alive and full of bustle; and we have long foreseen that vast numbers of people, will, in future years, flock over from England to France and Belgium, and other not very distant countries. This view of things has been to us a strong motive for print- ing our book; because we wished to furnish our fishing friends with such a guide as would render their visits to these countries pleasant and full of sport. On those parts of France and Belgium, which lie along the coast nearest to England, or are close to it, we have been more minute in what we have said, than on those places which are more distant and remote from the shores of Britain ; because the latter are not so often seen by the angler who rambles but for a short time in these foreign lands. But, we trust, that on whatever side he may enter into France or Belgium, he will find the rivers near the spot sketched out and treated of, with such care and pains, as will make his progress along the smaller streams he may visit at once easy PREFACE. XV and rapid. There is no river of any note for- gotten or passed over in the wide range which our subject includes. The plan of our book differs from that of any other we have met with on a kindred subject ; but we hope it will be looked upon as founded on good logic, and the very nature of things. We have four leading parts the first treats of fish and their natures and instincts ; the second of the kinds of tackle and baits used in catching them ; and the third and fourth of those countries, rivers, and streams within the scope of our work where they are to be found. Our object has been to make our treatise useful, both as a common fishing-book, and also as a partial guide to the districts and countries to which we desire to direct the views of the British angler. No excuse need be made, we hope, for thte slight notice we have sometimes taken of subjects not closely allied to the art of angling. We have glanced at them from an idea, that the angler in France or Belgium would be more or less a lively, well-taught, thinking person, with a mind Xvi PREFACE. open to such things as might, from their nature, be fitted to employ and improve a fleeting mo- ment in his casual ramblings. As we do not profess to be anything beyond mere simple anglers, we enter into no learned and subtle account of our finny friends, leaving such fine statements, couched as they often are in Anglo-Greek or bastard Latin, to the forward children of science who are growing up so fast on all sides. And, now, kind and patient reader, having said thus much in our prattling style, by way of " getting your ear," as it is called in the lan- guage of the very cunning ones, and thus creating some previous feeling in our favour, we request you will turn your eye upon the next leaf, and do us the honour to muse awhile on those varied themes, which we have thrown alDOut, somewhat at random it may be, in the pages of our Introduction. HINTS ON ANGLING, ETC., ETC. INTRODUCTION. "ALL Fish," says old Caspar Schwenkfeld, in his Therio Trophaum Silesia, " by reason of the nature and custom of the elements from which they have sprung and derive their virtue, and on account of their cold and gelatinous nature, are very difficult of digestion. They also gene- rate cold and phlegmatic blood, from whence many similar grievous disorders date their origin; for they weaken the nerves, and prepare them for paralysis: and as they injure the more cold and damp stomach, so, on the contrary, they greatly benefit the more bilious and warm."* Whether a London alderman, or any other distin- guished gourmand, revelling on the delicate white flesh of the rich turbot, or gloating over the rosy charms of the luscious salmon, with their approved delicious and appetising sauces, would be inclined to subscribe to the opinion of the old Prussian physician, is a problem of * Edition, Leipsic, 1603. B 2 HINTS ON ANGLING. very easy solution. The illustrious gastronome who can placidly pack away six pounds * of fat flesh messed up into that apoplectic compound, called turtle soup, pre- vious to a more elaborate and Warner-like attack on the venison and other important and insinuating vivers, is not a likely subject to be frightened from his piggish pro- priety by the lucubrations of a silly old foreign physician, who never dined at a city feast, and could not explain the recondite harmonies which subsist between the velvet calipash and the verdant calipee. Fish will, indeed, continue to be devoured in spite of medicinal prognostics, and sanatory suggestions; and as it is to be presumed, they must first be caught before they can be eaten, the art of catching them will still attract the attention of, and exercise an influence over, a very large portion of mankind. There are few men who are not fond of fishing in some shape or other. Some spend the best years of life in fishing for position and preferment; not unfrequently in disturbed and dirty waters, belying their own consciences, and trampling on the rights and hopes of their fellow- men. Some fish for money, pelf, dross; indifferent as to the manner how, unscrupulous as to the means employed; most commonly in other people's pockets, regardless alike of widows' tears and orphans' wrongs. Others again, with sleek exterior and elongated visage and pious phrase, disguise the sharp hooks of their sensuality and worldliness, under insinuating baits, gathered amidst the glories of futurity and anointed with the unguents of eternity, to beguile the feeble and unwary, and to extract from other * See Kitchener's Cook's Oracle, " small receipt for turtle soup" ; or Cobbett's Register for August, 1808. INTRODUCTION. 3 men's awakened fears, or the misdirection of their best affections, the solid enjoyments of a fleeting scene which they affect to despise, whose harmless pleasures arouse their holy indignation and kindle up their religious zeal. Mankind, in fact, are angling in one direction or another through all the various walks in life ; and it is perhaps beyond a question, that the veritable angler the enthu- siast of "the gentle craft," who treads the margin of the mountain-stream, or paces the placid meadows, or muses by the babbling waterfall, and seems to steep his spirit in the vast ocean of heavenly blue which gushes out from the deep fountains of the sky, is more harmlessly, and intellectually, and therefore more rationally, em- ployed, than all the others put together. His innocent pleasures are founded on no man's wrongs; his enjoy- ments cost no bitter and unavailing tears; his luxuries are purchased at no fearful price of human sweat and blood ; his wealth is not wrenched from the stores of the feeble, nor wrung from the pittances of the wretched; nature pours out for him with lavish hand the secret abundance of her inexhaustible treasury ; and rich, in her pure and sinless gifts, his soul swells with the sublimest gratitude, and holds dread converse in its trembling joy with the Infinite and Eternal. Old Izaak Walton has a budget of odd, quaint fancies, about the origin and antiquity of fishing. Following, it may be presumed, some antiquated fabulist, he imagines that Seth was the first who devoted himself to the gentle art ; that he taught it to his children, and bequeathed it to mankind at large, by engraving the method, in com- mon with music and other arts, on the large pillars which he is supposed to have erected, and which, surviving the 4 HINTS ON ANGLING. havoc of the universal deluge, preserved the knowledge of these arts for the immediate descendants of Noah. These dim traditions for which old Izaak has been un- deservedly sneered at by one of his commentators may or may not be the mere dreams of old enthusiasm ; but there can be little doubt, that fishing, like hunting, must necessarily have been practised at a very early period for the purposes of mere animal subsistence, before the other arts of life could possibly have been called into existence. Some have supposed that all these matters, like the knowledge of God, were revelations to the first man ; and truly there seems to be no insurmountable difficulty in the way of adopting this solution. The arts of fishing, hunting, and even mining, with many others, are spoken of in Job and Genesis, not in a formal and stately manner, as if announcing a new or recent dis- covery, but purely as a matter of course, as a mode of illustrating the subject in hand, by a plain allusion to practices familiar to the reader, and perfectly intelligible to every body. Spinning, weaving, mining, coining, working in iron and brass, making spears, swords, hooks, etc., etc., appear to have been as common in the days of Abraham and Job, as at this hour ; and the fourth only in descent from Cain, is called the father of those who are recorded in the fourth chapter of Genesis as being eminent for their excellence in particular arts. The germs, the first faint principles of this species of knowledge, might be communicated to the first man by a special revelation, which would be left to man's own ingenuity and dexterity to expand and improve ; and, indeed, a high degree of excellence, a vast improvement in these matters, seems to have been effected as early as the fifth in descent from Adam. If the harp and the organ, at present the noblest INTRODUCTION. 5 instruments of modern science, however rude and imper- fect in their earlier structure, yielded up their secret har- monies to the touch of Jubal ; if the crude and unmanage- ble iron and tin became elastic and obedient in the hands of Tubal Cain ; why may we not suppose that suitable instruments for hunting and fishing, those very first employments of the noble fathers of our race, would be invented and adapted with all speed, for such an important and, indeed, necessary purpose ? In the days of Moses, we know the Israelites ate freely of fish (which was served up with cucumbers as salmon is at present), in the land of Egypt, as is recorded in the eleventh chapter of Numbers ; and through the works of the later prophets continual allusions are made to the practice of fishing, and the implements, such as nets, hooks, etc., employed in the process. It is recorded of the great Solomon, that he " spake of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes;" and we may well regret the loss of these works, as a book on angling by the wisest of men would have been a treasure indeed. That the art was sufficiently common in the days of the Saviour, must be obvious to the most casual reader of the New Testament ; and it has always appeared somewhat ex- traordinary and suggestive to our minds, that the greatest revolution the world has ever witnessed the greatest change which has ever been effected on human society, and which is destined to advance and increase, until all mankind shall share the benefits of its influence, both in this world and in another state of being, was brought about by the agency of a few poor fishermen. It would seem as if the innocency and harmlessness of their gentle occupation had acted as a becoming preparation for that life of gentleness and charity, and purity and benevolence, 6 HINTS ON ANGLING. which was to distinguish them above all men, and give them their glorious pre-eminence in the universal church of Christ. As we descend the stream of time, we find the Greeks and Romans, as well as all the people of the wide East, in the full practice and approval of the art of fishing, not merely as a means of livelihood, but as a source of recreation and pleasure. The ancient Athenians had a law about the sale of fish, which might be adopted with advantage by the sage gourmands who preside over the rules which regulate the London markets. " Fishmongers," says the Greek law, " shall not lay their stinking fish in water, thereby to make it more vendible." And again, " that fishmonger shall incur punishment, who shall over- rate his fish, and take less than he first proffered them for." The Eomans held fish in the highest estimation ; and the accounts which have descended to us of their magnificence and extravagance, in breeding and preserving them for the purposes of luxury and recreation, are scarcely credible. In later times, the attention of the legislators of Europe has been frequently directed to the subject ; and the gentle art for centuries ranked amongst the necessary accomplishments of the finished gentleman. In our own day, the love of the craft seems to have lost none of its old ardour and influence; and, despite the sneer of shallow pride, or the smirk of pompous dulness, the votaries of the angle still bid fair to be as numerous and enthusiastic as during any former period. In England, the taste for this healthy, rational, and innocent enjoyment, increases every day ; and in France, the enactment of a wise law on the subject, secures an abundance of sport for the fair and genuine angler, the hater of nets and traps, and trimmers and ground baits, the veritable INTRODUCTION. 7 enthusiast, who loves to wander in the free air and wide champaign, and relies for success solely on his own patience, dexterity, and skill. To gratify this peculiar taste, so universal, as to be almost natural, books on fishing, on the habits and haunts of fish, and on the most approved methods of catching them, have of late years issued from the press as " thick as leaves in Vallombrosa ;" and the avidity with which they are bought up, and their contents devoured with de- light by both old and young, incontestably proves that the gentle art has lost none of its attractions, even amongst the false maxims and affected superiority of modern civilisation. We have perused most of the books on Angling, which have teemed from the press within the last five and thirty years ; but without passing any judgment on their general or particular merits, we confess we have still an unalloyed fondness for dear old Izaak Walton. Taking all things into consideration, he is the best author on the subject ; and he has certainly been the most fortunate in point ef reput- ation and fame. We like his quaint, local and personal style. It accords most beautifully with the subject-matter of his work. We do not know how to account satisfac- torily for the fact ; but we always feel a peculiar pleasure in reading books written upon the plan of Walton. The mind seems to delight in roaming about from one incident to another ; a habit which appears to produce the same kind of pleasure as we derive from the well-regulated conversation of a few intelligent friends, whose memories are well stored with amusing and instructive anecdote. There is, besides this, another source of pleasure in perusing literary works like old Izaak's. They become as it were, dramatic by age. It is one of the privileges of 8 HINTS ON ANGLING. time, to shed a species of poetry upon that on which he has long looked, which is felt by all minds. The comic representations of Congreve, Etherege, Wycherly, Van- burgh, Farquhar, etc., etc., were, when first written, merely witty portraits of every-day characters, scenes, and events; they are now poetical, because they belong to another age. Time throws a halo around them, which they did not at first possess; and that which originally tickled the intellect, now excites and fills the imagination. Hence it is, that all records and pictures of old times are pleasing, and have ever been so; and hence also, is it, that books written in a quaint and familiar style, have ever retained a firm hold on the public mind. We find from History, that this has been an interesting species of literature in all ages. Pliny the elder says that he always felt inexpressible pleasure in perusing works full of incidents and personal familiarities. It is said of the great Grecian lawgiver, that he read with avidity all local and personal chronicles of his time, and considered them more improving than profound and for- mal essays on political topics. Lord Bacon had a similar turn of thought ; for it is related of him that the members of a club-house in Paternoster -row, which he frequently attended, gave him the name of Lord Gossip, from his delight in anecdotes, and his propensity to individual and personal matters. Walton, too, has been a fortunate writer, in point of literary reputation. This may easily enough be accounted for. The ordinary history of literature tells us, that many authors have established a fame as durable as the rocks themselves, by a lucky and well-timed selection of a particular subject. There are many things which come within the sphere of literary treatment, which will never INTRODUCTION. 9 bear repetition. They are invested with just that portion of interest to make them always agreeable, when treated of by one particular pen ; but no more. All attempts to give variety and enlargement to such topics, necessarily prove abortive and ridiculous. The reason on which this canon of literary criticism rests cannot be satisfactorily accounted for, except by simply referring it to the natural order and constitution of things. What more interesting to the feelings of human beings, at all times and seasons, than the grave ? yet Gray's Elegy is the only one that ever has been or ever will be written, under the auspices of immortality. There can be no doubt, that there have been hundreds of authors since the time of De Foe, who could have written as good a Robinson Crusoe as his own ; but the stigma of a repetition would nullify whatever ability and genius might be displayed in such an undertaking. Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress is a striking illustration of the paramount influence of a well-timed treatment of a particular subject. Mankind will never tolerate a second Don Quixote; nor will the adventures of Gil Bias ever lose their influence by any rival attempts to delineate the same kind or class of hu- man characters and events. Swift's Gulliver's Travels and his Tale of a Tub set all imitators or improvers at defiance. Precisely so is it, with respect to Izaak Walton. He has taken up a certain position from which no one can hope to dislodge him, let his talents and acquirements be what they may. The superior facilities which modern travelling, through the agency of steam, affords for visiting different coun- tries with rapidity and security, will in all probability greatly increase this species of literature, and thus furnish the youth of England with fresh motives for enlarging 10 HINTS ON ANGLING. their ideas and expanding their intellects, by inducing them to obtain, through the medium of a noble and healthy recreation, a closer and more accurate acquaint- ance with foreign manners and habits, than was permitted to a former generation, or may be extended to that which is to follow. Who knows whether an intercourse of this kind, begun in youth, and continued on through ad- vancing life, may not influence to a considerable extent, the opinions of the young men who are to form the future statesmen and legislators of Europe, and beget in them those kindly, rational, and Christian feelings of mutual benevolence and good- will, which may assist in preserving to an indefinite period the benefits of that peace which the nations now enjoy the continuance of which must unquestionably prove of incalculable benefit to all. We make these observations with a view to direct the attention of our young sportsmen to a part of the continent which lies within a day's journey of their own shores, abounding in all the requisitions for an intellectual angler, cheap, secure, beautiful; a part over which thousands of British youth dash away every year, bestowing upon it a mere transient passing glance, to spend their time, health, and money, in the enervating climes of the south; a part of which they literally know nothing, save the names and localities of two or three of the principal towns, with perhaps their most notorious cafes and other dissipated and scarce reputable haunts; a part also, which, abounding in valuable public libraries where every facility is liberally afforded to the stranger, will enable him to combine rational recreation and intellectual enjoy- ment, to an extent not to be exceeded in any country under the sun. INTRODUCTION. 11 This part of the continent the north of France is rich, too, in historical recollections, which must be ever fresh and verdant in the breast of an Englishman. Here lies the scene of those exploits which the pen of Froissart has bequeathed to all time; where the noblest chivalry the world has ever witnessed, displayed its unrivalled courage and its indomitable valour. Amidst these swelling hills, fertilised by the best blood of France and England, lie the glorious battle-fields, which, after the lapse of four centuries, still ring out their imperishable renown; and when the wanderer gazes on the field of Cressy or the green mounds of Azincour, his eye must indeed be dim, and his English heart indifferent to the throb of patriotism, if the one does not kindle, and the other glow, beneath the inspiring recollections. Amongst these forest hills, imagination may still call into existence the long decayed banner of Pucelle, and the wondrous and inspired maiden may again walk forth in her beauty and her pride, to snatch from reluctant hands the laurels they had so hardly won. In fact, the roaming enthusiast can scarcely set his foot on a single spot in these fruitful plains which is not enriched by human blood ; on which some noble heart has not broken ; which has not been the scene of some dreadful carnage or some stirring incident ; and the celebrated " Field of the Cloth of Gold" re- mains a lasting record of the arrival of a new order of things, the last public display on the theatre of Europe, of the noble and high-minded chivalry of former days, before it passed away for ever. The plunderers of the sword have ceded place to the plunderers of the pen, and the other crafts which torture modern civilisation ; but the throbs and throes of the nations of Europe those unmistakable * hints which 12 HINTS ON ANGLING. occur from time to time in every country are sufficient to convince the thoughtful mind, that although the age of chivalry is passed, the age of public justice and na- tional happiness has not yet arrived. The English angler on the continent, it must be re- membered, is a somewhat different personage from his brother who plies his art in his own native land. The former will, in most cases, be a man of lively curiosity and enterprise. He will know something of the history of Europe ; have a taste for some departments of the fine arts; will possess political sentiments and feelings more or less excited; the past events of the world's history will still be matter of deep interest to him; and, in fact, he will generally be a person who has some fair acquaintance with the current literature of the age. On this account, a book on angling in a foreign land must necessarily deviate, both in matter and arrangement, from a similar work, which proposes for its end merely the ordinary purposes of a domestic manual. On entering into a foreign country, a man's feelings and curiosity must be very considerably excited, no matter what may be the amount of his knowledge, or the current of his opinions. The difference of manners, religion, language, and poli- tical institutions, must develop new trains of thought, and evolve new rules of judgment ; and hence it is that no art or amusement has the same limited range for the wanderer, that it has in his own country. Our main object, and indeed our heart's, desire, is to extend the art of angling amongst all classes of persons. We know it is calculated to exercise a beneficial influence on their minds and morals, and to give the younger part of the community a really right direction. The art, in its very highest degree of perfection and skill, may soon INTRODUCTION. 1 3 be acquired ; and, when once thoroughly understood, it abides with its votary through life. To those whose ardour and enthusiasm are apt to evaporate, when unex- pected difficulties present themselves and success seems uncertain or remote, to all such we shall submit some re- marks made in our own hearing to persons of this very class, by one of the most accomplished literary anglers in Europe, Professor Wilson, of Edinburgh. To a gentleman who was lamenting that his success in the art was not equal to his anticipations, the professor addressed himself in nearly the following words, words so highly charac- teristic of the man, and which made so deep an impres- sion upon our mind when we heard them, that we committed them to writing on the spot, and have reli- giously preserved them ever since. " The want," said the professor, " of success in fishing, sir, most commonly arises from want of prosecuting the object with indomitable perseverance. For it may be observed of a certain class of men, that they owe their success in life, and fame after it, to their having seized, and acted on one leading idea. Of the men whom the world allows to be really great, a large portion may be fairly assigned to this class. The very greatest men have perhaps been versatile ; and have possessed minds capable of grasping and carrying into active practice, ideas and conceptions of a cast and nature the most opposite and apparently irreconcilable. These, it must be confessed, are of the very first class of greatness. Caesar was not only a commander of the first order, but an orator, second only to Cicero, and an author second to none amongst the writers of prose. Homer not only astonished man- kind by the sublime conceptions of the Iliad, but also captivated them with the descriptive beauty and romantic 14 HINTS ON ANGLING. pathos of the Odyssey, and at last amused them with the heroic burlesque of the ' Battle of the Frogs and Mice.' Shakspeare was equally great in tragedy, comedy, ro- mance, and broad farce. Ariosto mingled all these toge- ther in his exquisite Orlando Furioso, as did the inimitable Cervantes in his unrivalled Don Quixote. Aristotle was an imaginist and poet, as well as a logi- cian, philosopher, and philologist. Bacon was an essayist and natural philosopher, as well as an annalist and a lawyer. How different, however, is the second class, as we may term it, of greatness. Here we see men arriv- ing at eminence, merely by chalking out and steadily pursuing one undeviating road through life ; by carrying out in all its ramifications one sole idea ; steering conti- nually by one guiding star; acknowledging a soleness of object, a unity of aim, and a singleness of apprehen- sion. Thus we see the single great idea which led to the discovery of America, constituted the whole life of Columbus ; and we know that the plan of his Indian conquests filled the daily thoughts, and conjured up the nightly visions of Alexander the Great. Thus the de- struction of Carthage was the sole policy of Cato; the subversion of the Roman power the very life of Han- nibal. The whole soul of Galileo was evidently bound up in the discovery of the true solar system and uni- versal empire the perpetual dream of Charles the fifth and Napoleon. Thus also the life of Bentham was one long codification, and the invention of the spinning jenny the darling object of the indefatigable Arkwright." The art of angling has been sometimes censured, and indeed condemned by the foolish and over-sensitive, on the ground of its cruelty. Now this is sheer folly and nonsense. That we have now become, as a nation, a INTRODUCTION. 15 very refined and particularly sensitive people, is a truth which daily experience and sundry acts of parliament oblige us to acknowledge. The ordinary sphere of hu- manity has long been too confined for our deep and numerous sympathies; and we have been driven to seek objects of compassion from almost every department of animated nature, in order to give full expression to our kindly and benevolent feelings. But who are they who sympathise so deeply with, and deprecate so piteously, the cruelties which the angler inflicts? Why, truly they are, for the most part, sanc- tified old maids, having long annuities, money in the funds, and sums deposited in savings' banks; a certain class of gentlemen clad in snug surtouts, with white neckcloths flourishing genteel black sticks, as they lounge about the doors of coffee-houses, confectioners', and fruit-shops in a forenoon; comfortable, pursy tradesmen, retired from business, their capacious legs immersed in lamb's- wool stockings, who now amuse themselves with dabbling in railway shares, and joint-stock companies of all sorts above the moon or under it; timid old ladies out of petticoats, in the shape of antique bachelors who cultivate melons, subscribe to horticultural societies and flower- shows, bid at auctions for tulips and Dutch roots, and give an enormous price for tortoise-shell tom-cats, and real poodle puppies ; persons particularly moral and religious, according to their own notions, who are great patronisers of lying-in hospitals, eye and ear infirmaries, and those os- tentatious inventions of modern charity soup-kitchens, where, decked in white aprons, they take their station on Saturdays, like good Samaritans as they are, to ladle out the greasy abomination. Add to these, pluralist par- sons with three livings, who preach four times a-year, 16 HINTS ON ANGLING. and invite their curates to dine with them once, to ce- ment the bonds of Christian charity ; poor-law guardians who are dissolved into tears once a- week over the miseries of pauperism, and expend their valuable time in weigh- ing out ounces of cheese, and measuring out gruel as a substitute foi carrion soup; worn-out public functionaries who have wasted their lives in riotous eating and drink- ing, and have retired upon a " compensation" sufficient to keep out wind and water; these, and such as these, with a few others of a different but equally contemptible stamp, are the principal personages who pour forth the tears of sympathy and regret over the sportive cruelties of the unfortunate angler. To give a particular instance, in which this species of extravagant and mock sentimentality was publicly ex- hibited, we shall mention a peculiarly interesting scene, which was enacted about five years ago by the then lord mayor of London and the lobster merchants of Billings- gate. It would appear, from the police reports, that the most inhuman and, indeed, diabolical cruelties had been perpetrated for many years in the London market, by a certain class of lobster fishermen, who, being grossly igno- rant of the humanising doctrines of the age, had followed the ancient and cruel practice which is termed " pegging" the lobsters. The necessity for this heathenish and bar- barous custom, arose, it was alleged, from the unculti- vated and quarrelsome propensities of the lobsters them- selves, which, not having been placed under any civilising influences whatever, did, when removed from their natu- ral element, and put into unaccustomed baskets, squabble and, indeed, quarrel in a terrible manner on their way to the metropolis, previously to being scalded to death and remorselessly devoured by the most tender-hearted and INTRODUCTION. 17 philanthropic citizens on the face of the globe. His lordship denounced this horrid practice with all that effective and dignified eloquence which usually charac- terises civic circumstances, and matters touching the well- being and happiness of the creature. His lordship's judicial habits enabled him to discover two unfortunate truths ; namely, that lobsters were animals; and that, consequently, they came under the humane protection of an "act of Parliament." After having pursued this refined and subtle argument through all its most distant and logical ramifications and consequences, he stumbled upon a most important fact, which seemed to arouse all his best feelings and acutest sensibilities. It occurred to his lordship that, in addition to the cruelty of this nefarious practice, it exercised a fatal influence on the flavour and condition of a favourite delicacy; which was more than sufficient to decide the merits of the question. His lordship saw at a glance into the very pith of the matter. His stomach poked him into the very marrow of the case. All reasoning on the subject was immediately set aside, and the " uneducated" and irreligious lobster " peggers," were denounced by his benevolent lordship, as the most savage and barbarous monsters that were ever allowed to go unhanged. We have always maintained, that we were prepared to take the accusations of cruelty urged against the angler into serious consideration, when those who advance these charges relinquish the habit of eating fish when they declare their intention of renouncing beef, mutton, veal, and sucking pig when they shudder, instead of slobber, over crimped salmon and cod, an operation which, to be effective, must be accomplished whilst the fish are alive when they reject stewed eels, because they are invariably C 18 HINTS ON ANGLING. skinned before life is extinct when they discard the delicate shrimp from their breakfast tables, previous to a philanthropic visit to some public meeting, because they must of necessity be boiled alive, in order to obtain their brilliant colour and delicious crispness when they cashier capons, on account of the odious process by which they are fattened when they turn with loathing from tender turkeys, and choice chickens, and darling ducks, because rusty penknives are thrust down their throats, and their gullets gashed about, and they are in this state, of torment and agony, hung up by their heels till the wretched life distils from them drop by drop, that their flesh may be sufficiently white for the fastidious eye of the sleek man of meretricious mercies when, we repeat, the daily delicacies obtained by such practices are re- nounced with becoming horror, and the practices them- selves denounced with all the frothy energy of an Exeter Hall orator when this is done, but not till then, there will be time enough to discuss the question of cruelty then, perhaps, it may be necessary to advance a serious argument in defence of the angler's calumniated recreation, against the hypocrisies of the passing hour. The angler has been often ridiculed as a fanciful man, and the amusement itself condemned, as calculated to ex- tend the power of the imagination beyond its wholesome and legitimate boundaries. His " vagaries," as they have been termed, have often been the theme of heavy jokes and leaden sarcasm, by the grave, slow-blooded, cal- culating, sober, jog-trot plodders of this world the totters-up, the patient seekers of pelf, the dot-and-go-one men, who universally indulge in this species of merriment. But we must stand up for our craft ; and, therefore, we may plainly retort upon our opponents, that " vagaries" INTRODUCTION. 19 are not confined to anglers. If you want them in per- fection, you must go elsewhere. You must go to the grave formal treatises, put together by the plodding, the diligent, the calculating, the scientific you must go to engineers without wigs, and doctors with them to cal- culators of levels, distances, diameters, and forces to chemists, and laborators, and manipulators of all kinds to men, in short, of grave physiognomies, dirty hands, and begrimed countenances, who never were in love with any thing but cog-wheels, high-pressure engines, convex rails, furnaces, horizontal chimneys, retorts, spirit-levels, theodolites, and spinning jennies. In fact, if you want to see the " vagaries" of the human mind on the " high ropes," in the highest state of rankness, you must go to a patent office, or a parliamentary agency establishment. There, together with the rarest efforts of human ingenuity, you will find a strange admixture of extravagancies beyond the dreams of madmen, the exaggerations of the poet, or the speculations of the philosopher. It is impossible to caricature the list of projects of the brain exhibited in such places. Sir Able Handy's plan of making saw-dust into deal boards, or the hunting razors by which a man might shave himself when galloping after the hounds, are far below some of the supereminently intellectual pursuits of the day, which are patronized and fostered and cherished and paid for by a " discerning public." It has been objected to the art of angling, that it is an idle waste of time, which might be turned to far better account; a devotion of valuable and irrevocable hours to a pursuit undeserving so great a sacrifice. This, we apprehend, is a quiet way of begging the entire question a cool assumption of the very fact which the objector is bound to prove. The angler alleges that his hours are 20 HINTS ON ANGLING. not wasted, in any sense deserving of the term. If, for his favourite pursuit, he renounce the marts of gain, and surrender the opportunities of accumulation, and so leave less of the world's wealth behind him when he goes to his long home ; he affirms that he has sufficient for all his rational wants, that, if his means be shorter, his desires are limited in proportion ; and he contends that worldly appliances may be obtained at too costly a price; that in his estimation, they are not worth the daily sacrifices which are made for them ; that they confer no happiness which cannot be procured without them ; that, judging by the examples which crowd around him, he dreads their corroding influence on the affections, and deems them a poor exchange for that equanimity of mind, independence of thought, and elevation of sentiment, which are en- gendered by a close intercourse and secret communing with the mysterious agencies of nature. At all events, the gentle craft is liable to no objections on this score, which are not also strictly applicable to every other pursuit which passes under the name of a " recreation." What, we may ask, can be more absorbing than modern " fox- hunting"? The fascinations of this amusement are admitted on all sides. In the hands of our nobility and gentry, it has actually become a mere matter of ordinary business, one of the necessary occupations of life; and expensive establishments are kept up for its indulgence and gratification. All this necessarily engenders a taste for expense and display in the matter; and the habits of our youth are not, we imagine, very materially benefited by the mode in which the " brilliant day" is too frequently terminated. Will any one seriously contend that this is a more innocent, more soul-elevating, and less time- wasting amusement, than the angler's calumniated occupation? INTRODUCTION. 21 Objections of a similar kind may be made to shooting, cricketing, and boating ; to say nothing of the less doubt- ful amusements of play-going, card-playing, billiards, etc., etc. In what respect, then, we may demand, that has reference either to the promotion of health, or the elevation and discipline of the mental faculties, do any of these pursuits possess the slightest advantage over the calmer, and more placid recreation of the unpretending angler? The world judges harshly and erroneously on this subject; and the worst of it is, generally acts upon a judgment which is altogether indefensible. The wealthy and well-connected rector, in England, for instance, gallops across the country after the hounds, shares in all the wild excitement of the noble sport, and fights the battles of the day over again, amidst the flow of generous wine, at some con- vivial aristocratic board. The poor, working, drudging curate of the next parish, who muses away a few quiet hours, gladly stolen from graver pursuits, to lighten the burden of " hope deferred," is sneered at as a dull spooney, or reprehensible idler, with a " stick and a string," who may pick his mutton-chop unregarded by his luckier neigh- bour, and wonder over his tumbler of middling beer, what will be the cut of the next act of Parliament, which will be kindly made the law of the land, for the special direc- tion, improvement, and control of the half-starved curates of the establishment. Every body knows this to be the truth ; and every body will be able to call to his recollec- tion hundreds of instances of this kind ; and yet, every body such is the uncontrollable influence of wealth and outward appearance in stocking-weaving England every body praises, and patronizes, the expensive, extravagant, conviviality-producing amusements which appertain to the wealthy, and upper classes, and joins in the vulgar 22 HINTS ON ANGLING. witticisms, which the heaviest blockhead feels he has a sort of patent right to indulge in at the angler's expense. Such opinions, however, were not always current; and most probably the time is not far distant, when the present frothy, bubbly, state of things shall have been blown away by an inevitable catastrophe that a more whole- some and healthy mode of thinking will pervade the public mind, and cultivate among our youth, a taste for gentler pursuits, more favourable to mental improvement, and intellectual development. They will thus learn, that if, in the vigorous amusements of hunting, cricketing, boating, etc., etc., they may invigorate their bodies, and nerve their limbs, and practise their courage for the hour of their country's glory, or the season of her neces- sity, they may also, in addition to these corporeal advantages, derive health, recreation, elevation of senti- ment, and intellectual discipline and culture, by the side of murmuring brooks, or gentle rivers, casting the once despised line across the rippling stream, and feeling the full excitement of the sport, as the strong trout plunges short, or effectually hooks himself in his eager risings. To shew the estimation in which the art of angling was held in bye-gone days, it may suffice to notice an ecclesiastical canon on the subject, enunciated in times when the church was disciplined by a sufficiently strict rule, though not perhaps in accordance with modern acts of Parliament. The canon is alluded to by Walton ; but the reason assigned by the commentary for the permission given to spiritual persons to enjoy the pleasures of angling, is worth transcribing. The canon * states, that hunters have generally been sinners, citing the case of Esau; and that fishermen, in the scriptures, have com- monly been deemed holy. The commentary runs thus, * Decretals, Lyons, 1671. INTRODUCTION. 23 " Sed quare prohibetur venari, et non piscari? quia forte piscatio fit sine clamore, venatio non: vel quia major est delectatio in venatione; dum enim quis est in venatione, nihil potest de divinis cogitare." The great Ambrose, in his thirty-third homily, treats this subject in the same spirit ; and, indeed, the common sense of mankind, apart from the authority of the church, would naturally lead to the conclusion, that a recreation of so quiet and contemplative a nature as the amusement of angling, is far more appro- priately adapted to soothe the leisure hours of one who has received a commission to treat of purely spiiitual themes, to proclaim the tidings of redemption, and declare the terms of human salvation to point the way to heaven, and himself tread the self-denying path than a bold, violent, boisterous indulgence, which must neces- sarily banish gentle and patient thought, and too often requires undue sacrifices to the charms of society, not always of the better sort, and to the seductions of a con- viviality not always confined within becoming limits. When we think of the early founders of our faith, and contemplate their gentle and devoted characters, a fox-hunting parson does, indeed, seem a strange anomaly ; and yet in the present state and condition of the English church, such a one, if highly connected, or endowed with a superabundance of the " mammon of unrighteous- ness," may perchance obtain some distinguished mark of approbation, even from the hands of a successor of the Apostles. We have no wish to speak harshly of a church in which we were nurtured, and which we love, perhaps, a great deal more than many who bear her orders and receive her emoluments ; but we must be allowed to say a word or two in behalf of our "gentle craft," and with all due submission, we venture to suggest it to spiritual 24 HINTS ON ANGLING. persons as a far more seemly and appropriate recreation, than the wild excitement of the chase, with its accom- panying taste for horses, and the somewhat vulgar amuse- ments of the stable. In the rules and ordinances* for the guidance and dis- cipline of the French clergy in their mode of living, choice of amusements, etc., etc., a clergy, who have to contend with the powerful remains of indifference or infidelity the spawn of the Revolution still active amongst the middle classes and who are fighting with zeal and energy an arduous and truly uphill battle it is expressly forbidden to join in the amusements of the chase, whilst, at the same time, the humble and gentle art of angling has no interdict imposed upon it, because it is a quiet, innocent recreation, not only not incompatible with, but the actual promoter and encourager of study, meditation, and prayer. The art of angling is also to be approved and defended on account of its popular spirit. We have no feeling in common with the cant and intolerance manifested in England of late years, against the peculiar amusements and pastimes of the people. On the contrary, it always affords us the most lively gratification to see men unbend from the wasting pressure of incessant toil, and throw themselves into the vortex of unrestrained and rational hilarity ; and amongst the various kinds of amusements, none, in our humble opinion, surpasses fishing. In this fascinating pursuit, the old and the young, the wise and the foolish, the rich and the poor, the learned and the un- learned, the aristocrat and the plebeian, may mingle * Principes de conduite, ordonnances et statuts au diocese d' Arras, imprimes par ordre de Monseigneur 1'Eveque d' Arras." Arras, 1825. INTRODUCTION. 25 indiscriminately with each other ; drink copiously out of the same varied fountain of fun, frolic, and contemplation ; and each class can throw its modicum of delight into the common stock of enjoyment. Among the class of our conservative principles, there is one which we hold in deep veneration, viz., the social and individual advantages of the old system of English sports. We dwell upon the remembrance of these with a reverence bordering on idolatry. The pastimes and sports of our forefathers were manly and generous exercises, giving at once health to the body, and firmness and elasticity to the mind. The whole train of amusements in old days was calculated to render the youthful generation active, sprightly, nimble, vigorous, and courageous, and to rear them up to useful and honourable manhood. With what enthusiasm and right good-feeling do we ponder over the pages of Fitz Stephen, wherein he tells us, that in the year 1130, " In the holidays, in the summer, the gents are exercised in leaping, dancing, shooting, fishing, wrestling, casting the stone, and practising the shield; and the maidens trip with their timbrels, and dance as long as they can see." But angling is not only a most agreeable and delightful amusement it also imparts health and long life to its zealous and devoted disciples. We have witnessed its powerfully healing virtues, even at the very gates of dcjith itself. When we have seen a poor wretch aban- don himself to habits of unmitigated intemperance when he has thrown off every feeling of decency and de- corum when we have perceived the reddened eye, the blotched face, the trembling hand, the tottering step, the dull and idiotic air ; when he has endured repeated attacks of " delirium tremens," and his liver has become enlarged, and as hard as a Norfolk dumpling when he has shivered 26 HINTS ON ANGLING. all over with palsy, and his very bowels become feculent with disease when he has had a hard dry cough, one that comes by fits and seems to tear his emaciated carcase to pieces when his breath has been like the effluvium of a jakes, or the exhalations of a rotten fen when rising from his frowsy and restless bed, he has not been able to swallow a single mouthful, nor carry that mouthful to his head without previously drenching his stomach with bitters and brandy when dry colic and offensive diarrhoea have taken turn and turn about in his miserable intestines when his legs have been swelled as big as mill-posts, and surcharged with water when tapping has grown useless by repetition, and belladonna ceased to act when his chest has been as full of bilge- water as the wreck of a leaky herring smack when, in fact, he has become one incarnation of filth and disease, we have taken him by the hand, led him quietly to the banks of some pleasant stream, and put a rod into his languid grasp; and then, with the indispensable assistance of Father Mathew, have restored him with renovated health to his heart-broken family, and again made him a useful member of society. We love angling, too, because it takes us from the confusion, the filth, and the social and moral degra- dation of large towns and cities. It places us in close contact with one of the most important divisions of human labour and skill the cultivation of the soil, which is the real foundation of all national wealth and true social happiness, and which the ancients held in such high estimation that they ascribed divine honours to those who were successful inventors of useful and practical modes of husbandry. Every thing connected with the land is calculated to foster the best and noblest feelings of the soul, and to give the mind the most lofty INTRODUCTION. 27 and sublime ideas of universal nature. To men of genius and contemplative habits, the roaming along river-banks, and beside placid waters, gives rise to the most refined intellectual enjoyments. Such persons move in a world of their own, and experience joys and sorrows, with which the world cannot intermeddle. How lively, then, how pure, how refined, how truly exquisite, must those delights be to the mind which can penetrate into Nature's works, and gaze with instructed eye on the woods, the rocks, and waterfalls ! And how evanescent and worthless does every thing appear, which such a one leaves behind him in the crowded and pent-up city ! It must, in short, be obvious to the most careless ob- server apparent to the most prejudiced antagonist of the gentle art that, the frequent opportunities afforded the angler of contemplating the ever- varying aspect of nature, cannot fail to be attended with advantages of no mean order; inasmuch, as such contemplations have a direct tendency to elevate the mind, and subdue and purify the heart. Under the influence of those awful sublimities, which mountain, and rock, and tree, and torrent throw around their united presence, the mind imperceptibly assumes a tone which harmonises with these striking scenes; and as the giant shadows sweep across the broad brow of the majestic mountain, and the free breeze comes laden with mysterious music through the waving boughs, which sob and sigh in unison with the passing strain, the full heart gushes over in its deep delight, and the imagination teems with those shadowy phantoms of un- seen glory, to which the poet's soul owes some of its loftiest aspirations. Amidst the calmness and repose of more quiet and placid scenery, where the sublime gives place to the 28 HINTS ON ANGLING. picturesque and beautiful; where the hills slope up from the rich green-sward, and the river murmurs through the verdant meadows, and the village spire peeps over the trees, and the tinkling bell announces the hour of prayer; where the flocks whiten the tree-less front of some green promontory, and the distant mill-clack just makes itself heard above the hum of bees, and song of birds, and lowing of distant cattle, and the thousand soothing sounds which spring up from the ongoings of the village day; the mind insensibly falls into a musing train of gentle thought; and images of peace, and tranquillity, and gentleness, rise unbidden on the soul, fill it with a calm and quiet joy a sea of gentle hopes and benevolent projects and banish away all the sordid maxims and ungenerous principles which are engendered in the smoky town, amidst the scufnings of rival traffickers, or the heart- lessnesses of the amassers of wealth. The heart becomes sensible of better influences than these ; and the thoughts which owe their origin to the impressions which are derived from the contemplation of natural objects, are generally such as religion sanctifies, and reason approves. The stern and remorseless passions of our nature yield to the genial suggestions ; and there must indeed be an in- eradicable root of bitterness, a tenacious germ of malignity, in that breast which is not softened by the calm silence of eternal Nature, or filled with generous impulses of benevo- lence and good-will, by the music of her persuasive voice. The patriarch of old, " went out to meditate in the field, at the even tide;" the Saviour himself sought the sublime solitude of the still mountain, when he went forth to pray; and the early Christians reared their simple altars amidst the secret recesses of the sanctuaries of nature, where, free from the interruptions of INTRODUCTION. 29 relentless persecution, they might forget the surrounding world of temptation and hostility, and hold deep com- munion with their God. The angler, although not actuated by such high motives, still perceives and acknowledges the influence of such scenes, and often we confidently appeal to our brethren of the craft often, as his eye roams over the sweet scenery which surrounds him, the tear holy type of penitence rises almost spontaneously, the indescribable thought kindles in his heart, and the warm prayer gushes unpremeditated from his soul, sincere, heartfelt, true because offered when none can hear, and none behold, but He who neither slumbers nor sleeps. THE INVITATION. The early sun is rising fair and bright ; And dancing lightly on each spangled spray, The pearl-drops glisten in the dewy light, That bathes in fragant balm the morn of May. The thick white mists are springing far and fkst, Beneath the glowing orb's absorbing beam, To swell with showers the light clouds floating past, Predicting glorious sport in pool and stream. Oh ! what a gush of joy o'erwhelms the soul, When Nature pours her matin song of praise! What waves of sweet, sad visions round us roll ! What deep and thrilling dreams the mind amaze! The gladsome heart bounds joyous, warm, and free, And throbs with rapture in the morning breeze, Which, fraught with mild and mystic melody, Comes fresh and frisking o'er the whispering trees. Arise, thou sluggard! Hark! The lark on high, His wild entrancing wood -note bravely rings ; He revels joyous in the morning sky, And soars away, and still, in soaring, sings. 30 HINTS ON ANGLING. What frantic rapture does his strain prolong ! No chilling, passionless performer he ! His little soul is steeped in floods of song, And pours its joy in that mad ecstasy. Sleep on, sleep on, those notes are not for thee ; They cannot drown thy deep and drowsy snore ; No joy for thee, in mountain, stream, or lea; Thou lov'st thy bed than morning ramble more! For thee, the angler's is a vulgar art ; His simple pleasures earn thy ready sneer : Well, well, in quiet peace at least we '11 part, My song affects not uncongenial ear. But thou, my friend, with kindred feelings rife, Wilt join the social converse grave or gay: Laugh at the passing joke, or share the strife, When smart discussions loftier themes display. Come, haste away ; and where the clear streams glide, Armed with the tapering line, and well sprung rod, Muse on the moral of their lapsing tide, Or hold dread converse with a present God. Ah! who can tell the holy thoughts that crowd, Thick o'er the heart when all around is still, When nothing moves but shade of passing cloud, And nought is heard but hum of yonder mill. Give me, Great Father, give me strength and health, A liberal heart, affections kind and free ; My rod my line be these my pride, my wealth ! They yield me present joys they draw my soul to Thee. PART I. DESCRIPTION OF FISH. ACCORDING to the plan we have ventured to lay down, we shall commence with a description of the fish usually sought after by the angler. At the head of this enumera- tion, we place Jje Salmon He The SALMON is a noble fish, and most deservedly retains the very highest rank in the angler's estimation. He is the prince of fresh- water visitors ; and his title to prece- dence has never yet been questioned. His magnitude, his keen and lively eye, his muscular powers, his rapid and graceful motions, his beautiful proportions, his shining silvery scales, his intellectual instincts, and his superior, rich, and delicate flavour, unite in establishing his decided superiority over all other fish. Neither should it be for- gotten that salmon-fishing is considered the angler's highest sport, whilst it affords the best criterion of his professional skill. Indeed, angling for this noble fish, may be deemed the measure or standard of the angler's 32 HINTS ON ANGLING. dexterity, the test of his professional proficiency, the legitimate object of his loftiest aspirations; affording an undeniable proof of his fitness to take his stand amongst the most accomplished adepts of this interesting craft. Much has been written, especially of late years, on the nature, habits, instinct, etc., of the salmon much that is amusing much that is not a little fanciful and much that is altogether wide of the mark. Young and enthusiastic anglers are, in some degree, like young and inexperienced travellers and navigators; they are constantly seeing something new, perpetually encountering marvels and prodigies. Their powers of generalising are, as yet, but feeble and in the bud, and fancy or wild conjecture too often usurp the place of reason and fact. In the following observations, we shall confine ourselves to those every-day appearances connected with the nature and peculiarities of the salmon, which present themselves to the attention of all intelligent anglers of this valuable and interesting fish; and carefully avoid those refined speculations and theories, which belong more properly to the science of natural history, than to the art of angling. The salmon spawns generally in the months of Septem- ber and October ; but there is a difference in this respect, in different rivers. This fact has been fully verified in Parliamentary reports, framed with reference to projected laws for the preservation of this kind offish. It is during this particular season of the year, that the salmon are to be seen passing up the rivers in enormous shoals, and leaping over every obstacle which' lies across their path. The extraordinary power and agility the fish display in these remarkable leaps, have long been the wonder of the naturalist, and a theme of admiration to THE SALMON. 33 the angler. They will spring over rapid falls, from seven to ten feet in height, and force their way against a powerful volume of descending water. It is when the salmon are running up streams of this description, broken by rapids, and crossed by cataracts; and when they thus meet with apparently insuperable obstacles to their pro- gress, that enormous quantities are killed by poachers and fish-hunters, with spears, leister and nets. We have frequently seen a band of men come down to celebrated salmon-rivers, in the north of England and in Scotland, with a cart and horse, and in a very short space of time catch as many lish as the horse could draw. In fact, the destruction of salmon at this season is quite appalling; and were it not for the vigilance of the guardians of the rivers, and the strictness of the laws, the species would scarcely be able to exist, under the constant repetition of practices so manifestly destructive and unfair. The mode in which the salmon disposes of its spawn, has been often dwelt upon and discussed by scientific anglers. But, as the subject does not immediately and necessarily come across the path of the sportsman, we shall not enter upon any elaborate description of this peculiar process, but rather content ourselves with a few general observations on the matter. For the secure and effectual deposition of its spawn, the salmon invariably selects pure running streams, with gravelly bottoms. All slow, stagnant, sluggish, and clayey bedded rivers are carefully avoided, or at most very, very seldom entered. In their choice of the stream, the fish never make any very serious mistake; but are conducted by an almost infallible instinct, to a safe and suitable place of deposit, with all the certainty and regularity that experience and reason could themselves confer. Salmon D 34 HINTS ON ANGLING. generally swim pretty close to tlie bottom of the river, and pursue their onward course with rapidity and decision ; and, indeed, some naturalists have affirmed that they frequently run at the rate of five-and-twenty miles an hour, in waters where they encounter no obstacles. When the gill, or male fish, finds a proper place, he works in the ground with his nose, until he has made a hole or bed sufficiently large for the reception of the spawn; and when this subaqueous nuptial couch is all prepared, he looks out for his mate; and they jointly take possession of their temporary residence. When the pro- cess is finished, they both return to their haunts in the river; or dash back to the sea on the first favourable opportunity. After the roe has been deposited a sufficient length of time in the bottom thus channelled by the industrious fish, it is quickened into life by some inscrutable process, and becomes salmon fry, which attain a length of from four to seven inches by the months of March or April. They then go down to the sea; and, in the months of June, July, or August, return to their native streams, increased by rapid growth and the fattening powers of the salt water, to a weight of from four to seven pounds. There is a fact connected with these young salmon- fry, which every fly-fisher who has plied his art in a salmon-stream will verify; namely, that they take the artificial fly with singular voracity in the months of March or April, just before they leave the river for the sea. And what is very curious, sometimes the angler will get nothing almost all the day but these smelts, as the young salmon-fry are called; and sometimes again, he will scarcely catch one, but trout only. The one is often in the finest humour for taking the fly, when the THE SALMON. 35 other will not look at anything you may put on the line. At other times, on the contrary, we have found both trout and smelt, darting at the same fly with equal voracity and determination. In some salmon-rivers, in the north of England and in Scotland, it is forbidden to catch the smelts; or, at least, it is expected that the fly-fisher should throw them all in again; but as far as our observation goes, we have never seen this rule obeyed to any extent, even by the most scrupulous and high-minded angler. With the mass of fishermen, the maxim unhappily holds good, that " all are fish that come into the net." There are two particular movements of the salmon, which the fly-fisher will find it absolutely necessary to attend to in his dealings with this monarch of the stream ; namely, his furious leaping when he is hooked, and his taking what is termed the " sulks," when exhausted by vain exertions to escape. After a fish has taken the fly, he often makes several desperate springs out of the water; and, if he happen in his fall to come across the line, he will most certainly either snap it, or break his hold. We have occasionally seen their springs so frequently repeated, that the fish was deprived of his best strength in a great measure, by the unusual exertion, and killed in a comparatively short space of time. When, however, a fish takes the "sulks," the matter assumes a very ominous appearance. In nine cases out of ten, you will lose him and your tackle also. He will run to his haunt either under a stone, or some old tree root, at the bottom of a deep hole, and there lie perfectly still. In this situation stones have been thrown down upon him, sticks have been poked into his den, and other similar 36 HINTS ON ANGLING. devices practised upon him, but all without avail. Now, as your line is necessarily so frail that you can do nothing when a dead lift comes; nothing is left you, but just to pull away until you break your gut or cast line, and leave the gentleman for another bout. Some anglers provide themselves with small leaden rings, which being put on the line, run down till they hit the nose of the sulking fish, when off he bolts with revived strength and activity, to renew the exciting and dubious strife. But sometimes even this plausible scheme fails in its object; and then the disappointed angler must console himself as well as he can for the loss of his anticipated prey. The salmon reaches a considerable size in many of the rivers of Europe ; some attaining the enormous weight of seventy or eighty pounds. The general weight is greatly below this; and from ten pounds to five-and-twenty may be considered a high average, even in the best salmon- rivers. There has been a controversy among anglers and naturalists, whether the salmon-trout and the salmon be one and the same fish. The prevailing opinion seems to be, that the salmon-trout is a distinct species from the genuine salmon. ^tottt Ha Next in importance to the salmon in the estimation of the genuine fisherman stands the TROUT. He is the stand- ard commodity of the enthusiastic angler. There are many expert and experienced fly-fishers who never enjoyed the exciting luxury of hooking and killing a salmon ; but no man can fairly lay claim to the appellation of an "angler," if he cannot kill trout with the rod and line in some way THE TROUT. 37 or other. There is something about trout-fishing which has exalted it in all ages above every other branch of the art, except, of course, that of salmon-fishing. If we attempt to analyse their preference we shall find it resolve itself into something appertaining to the attributes, qualities, or habits of this beautiful fish. He is an intel- lectual kind of creature, and has evidently a will of his own he looks sagacious and intelligent he sedulously avoids thick, troubled and muddy waters loves the clear and mountain stream displays an ardent ambition to ex- plore the rivers to their very source is quick, vigorous, and elegant in his movements likes to have the exclu- sive command of the stream keeps up a rigid system of order and discipline in the little community of which he is a member exhibits a remarkable degree of nicety and fastidiousness about his food is comparatively free from vulgar, low, and grovelling habits entices his pursuer into the loveliest scenes of nature's domains calls forth from man, his great enemy, the utmost efforts of his ingenuity and skill and, in a word, in every stage of his existence, preserves a superior and dignified demeanour, unattainable by any other living occupant of the streams. These may be styled the social and intellectual qualities of this glorious fish. His physical constitution is equally entitled to our respectful consideration. He boasts a prepos- sessing and fascinating figure moulded in strict conformity with the most refined principles of symmetrical proportion, sparkles in all the gorgeous colours of the rainbow, and occupies a distinguished position in the important science of gastronomy. These seem to be the more prominent reasons why the trout holds so high a rank in the angler's estimation. There must be mind, real or imaginary, in every thing 38 HINTS ON ANGLING. which enjoys human attention, in order to fix our serious consideration, and secure our lasting esteem. The trout, in disposing of its spawn, follows the identical rules which govern the salmon in this important process. He runs up rivers and torrents and brooks, in the months of September and October, and seeks out the most retired water flowing over gravelly bottoms for this annual operation. Like the salmon, he leaps over formi- dable obstacles in his progress, although he cannot cope, in point of muscular agility, with the prince of the waters ; still, in proportion to his size, the trout possesses quite as much physical vigour and daring as the lordly salmon. The leaps the trout will take when ascending the rivers in autumn are really quite astonishing. If we examine even the smallest rivulet or burn which runs into any good trout-stream we shall find it full of small trout-fry, the produce of the spawn which the parent fish had, under the pressure of apparently insuperable difficulties, con- trived to deposit. A trout of a pound weight, will often clear a leap four feet high. The period of the year in which trout are in the finest condition varies in different countries, and even in different rivers of the same country. The seasons also exercise a considerable influence. If the winter has been open and mild, the trout will be in fine order much earlier than if there had been long sharp frosts and heavy falls of snow. We have, in some rivers, such as the Tweed and Coquet, caught trout in tolerably good condition in the months of February and March. In the months of June and July they are generally supposed to arrive at their highest degree of perfection in strength, richness and flavour. The trout varies in size in different rivers and different THE TROUT. 39 countries, from the small Welsh trout of half a pound to the giants of some foreign rivers, which occasionally reach a weight of twenty or thirty pounds; but the general run of fish in trout-streams averages from half a pound to a pound and a half. In waters where they are very numerous, the number caught below half a pound will, in ordinary cases, far exceed those caught above that weight. It is an almost universal rule that where trout are large they are scarce. The age which trout generally attain has been a long disputed, and is as yet an undecided question among naturalists and anglers. Experiments have been made in ponds to settle this point ; but such tests are not quite satis- factory, in as much as they are, in some degree, artificial contrivances, and place the fish out of their usual haunts, habits, and modes of living. There can be little doubt, we apprehend, that the longevity of the trout varies with the country, and the nature of the stream it inhabits. We shall here recite two instances relative to the age of this fish, which have been noticed in other books on fishing. The first is the statement that a trout died in August, 1809, which had been in a well at Dumbarton castle for eight-and-twenty years. The other account is taken from the Westmorland Advertiser of some years ago. " Fifty-years since, the proprietor of Bond-hall, near Broughton, in Furness, when a boy, placed a male Fell- beck trout in a well, in the orchard belonging to his family, where it remained till last week, when it departed this life, not through any sickness or infirmity attendant on old age, but from want of its natural element, water the severe drought having dried up the spring a cir- cumstance which has not happened for the last sixty years. His lips and gills were perfectly white, although 40 HINTS ON ANGLING. his head was formerly black and of a large size. He regularly came, when summoned by his master by the name of ' Ned,' to feed from his hand on snails, worms, and bread. This remarkable fish has been visited, and considered a curiosity by the neighbouring country, for several years." The progress of trout towards maturity has also been a fruitful topic of discussion, and indeed remains undecided at the present hour. Some contend that they grow com- paratively quickly; others, on the contrary, maintain the opposite notion, and affirm that their growth is singularly slow. For our own part, we conceive them to be fish of slow growth; and we also imagine that many of them never attain any great size. We advance this opinion on the strength of two or three general facts, which have been repeatedly verified during an experience of thirty years' standing, and which also may be tested by the ex- perience of every inquisitive and observing angler, who will direct his attention to the subject. In the first place, in really good trout-streams, you will always find year after year the great mass of the fish nearly about the same size, no matter in what particular year you angle, or what kind of bait you use. We could name twenty trout-streams in England and Scotland, where ten out of every twelve fish caught in all seasons, will be within an ounce weight of each other. Now this uniformity among such numerous tribes can only be accounted for, on the supposition that they are of slow growth, and remain long stationary at the same size. If there were always a pro- gressive increase going on, even according to the most moderate scale of advance, we should not find this uniformity; but we should see trout of all sizes, and this, too, in -regular and equal proportions. THE TROUT. 41 In the second place, we find that large trout are seldom caught in rivers which abound with this fish. A fish of unusual size is one in perhaps ten thousand ; and the num- ber of intermediate grades is very small indeed. And, in the last place, from a careful personal observa- tion of bright clear rivers in dry hot seasons, you will perceive that the trout are all about the same size ; and should you detect any rare instances of difference among them in point of bulk, you will, perhaps, be inclined to agree with us, that the very diversity is strikingly con- firmatory of the slow and almost imperceptible growth of these interesting fish. Trout congregate together, and keep up a regular system of discipline and order among their tribes. This is easily discernible in clear bright streams, during fine sunny weather. You will sometimes see a dozen or a dozen and a half of trout all arranged, according to their sizes, in exact order. The largest of the troop take the lead; and the others fall behind, two and two, or three and three; the smaller fellows being always stationed at the bottom of the line. We have seen fish remain in this position for many hours without moving a single inch. If a little food be dropped in among the number the largest always claims, and is invariably allowed the privilege of first taking possession. All trout have their holds, or haunts, or places of re- treat. These are commonly some large stone, or trunk of a tree, or old timbers about mills, or overhanging rock. Each fish has his regular track or portion of water to range about in, and seldom trespasses on the liberties of his neighbours. If one of these divisions become vacant, it is soon filled up by a new occupant. Trout will remain for many weeks in precisely the same 42 HINTS ON ANGLING. spot. In the hot and dry summer of 1826, we observed a large fish about four pounds in weight, who for ten weeks never moved out of a small but rather deep stream. We tried him at intervals both early and late with fly, worm, and minnow; but all to no purpose. Soon after, a flood came down the stream, and we saw him no more. It is by taking cognisance of these holds, or haunts, that an angler who knows a river well possesses such a decided advantage over a stranger, however skilful and expert. The former knows to a certainty where the fish are lying ; and if he be unsuccessful on one occasion, he is almost sure to succeed on another. Trout pair at the latter end of June and in July, and are invariably both of the same size. They roam together, feed together, exist together, and seem to delight in each other's society. We have sometimes fancied that they express feelings of commiseration and affection for each other in times of peril and danger. This notion is founded on the following circumstances, which have occurred to us over and over again in the course of our experience. In fine, clear, still water, during bright hot weather, and under shady groves, we have discovered two trout which have paired, and with a worm, carefully dropped before their noses, have succeeded in hooking one of them. As the only way to kill a fish in such a situation is to hold him tight, and depend on the strength of the tackle, we have seen his companion sail round him, when struggling at the top of the water, and appear to be sensible of his danger. Even when the fallen fish lay panting and prostrate on the surface, we have known his mate come up, as if to assist him, and almost, in her affection, lay herself by his side. After the fish was THE TROUT. 43 drawn out of the water, his companion immediately aban- doned that particular locality ; but whether from a deep sense of an irreparable bereavement, we must leave to the opinion of the reader. There can be little doubt, we apprehend, that trout are remarkably susceptible of atmospheric influences. It is perhaps impossible to explain this; but our opinion is founded on circumstances like the following, which have fallen under our observation over and over again in many parts of Great Britain. We have started some beautiful morning with rod and fly, anticipating noble sport from the favourable aspect of the weather, the sky perhaps clear and settled, with a gentle breeze from the west or south west a more promising day could not well be imagined. The river was fished with uncommon care and assiduity ; all kinds of flies were tried in their turn, and every dodge which experience teaches was successively resorted to, but never a fish could be hooked; miles of ground were walked over, but not even a solitary rise could be obtained, and the fellow-craftsmen whom we met in our rambles were in precisely the same predicament. The waters, in fact, appeared as still and quiet as if there was not a single trout in them to disturb the calm surface. Well, in a short time, out comes the explanation. The next day is ushered in by a violent storm of snow or rain the waters rise the floods come down and the fish get gorged with food to their heart's content. Now, in our humble opinion, for we speak with diffidence on the sub- ject, this is a striking exemplification of the existence of a powerful instinct for a given end or purpose. The secret influences of the atmosphere, unperceivable by man, intimate to the wakeful and conscious fish that an abundant supply of food is at hand ; and on this account 44 HINTS ON ANGLING. they have no inclination to forestall the copious repast which awaits them. We never saw trout take freely immediately before or during powerful thunder-storms. or All the writers who have treated on fishing agree in describing the PIKE as the king or tyrant of the fresh waters. He has acquired this title by his extraordinary and shark-like voracity. Anecdotes illustrative of this peculiarity are detailed by numerous authors ; and indeed every body at all familiar with the habits and practices of this fine fish must have witnessed some remarkable proof of the accuracy of the general opinion. A few years ago, in a preserve in Lincolnshire, a large pike was seen to snap at a swallow as it poised lightly over the water in search of flies ; and a friend of ours once took seven or eight right good fish out of a pool at the tail of a lock, not far from the Earl of Winchilsea's seat in that county, with a few pieces of uncooked bacon. He went to the spot a well-known resort for pike in those days unprovided with bait; and on his arrival, owing to the extreme clearness of the water and the coldness of the day, he was unable to procure any with his cast-net. The lock-keeper urged him to try a lump of his bacon. In despair of getting any better bait; and unwilling to leave a favourite spot without a trial, he adopted the suggestion, and in a very short time despoiled the pool of its occupants, consisting of seven or eight respectable fish. Hundreds of stories of a similar kind are commonly related, and may be found in the fishing-books, but not- withstanding the numerous undoubted instances of his THE PIKE. 45 remarkable and fearless voracity onrecord, we have always found the pike a very dainty fish, and very difficult to catch in those preserves and pet waters where small silvery roach are very numerous. He can, in such situations, procure a delicate and plentiful repast whenever he wants one; for, greedy as he is, he does not, like the human glutton, eat for mere eating's sake: the one eats to live, the other lives but to eat; and, therefore, the fish may be considered the more respectable gourmand of the two. When his appetite is on, he is furious: when it is ap- peased, he is scarcely to be tempted. Practised trollers are well aware of this, and thoroughly understand the difference between the " runs" when a pike is hungry and in earnest, and when he is neither the one nor the other. When not stimulated by hunger, he is any thing but voracious, and will mouth a bait and play with it for a quarter of an hour in sheer sport, without the slightest intention of swallowing it. In this condition, he will often allow himself to be hauled about and quietly pulled up to the surface of the water, and then, with a careless flap of his tail, he coolly drops the bait from his jaws, and lazily rolls down again into deep water. The pike is generally believed to be a long-lived fish. Numerous stories are recorded more or less authentic, confirmatory of the prevailing opinion: and there can be little doubt, perhaps, that he will live to a very great age, if well fed and undisturbed. This fish, however, has too many enemies to allow him to survive many seasons, except in stews and private waters where he can remain secure and unmolested. Many anecdotes are preserved respecting the size which the pike is supposed to be capable of attaining. Wales is said to contain numerous enormous fish in its 46 HINTS ON ANGLING. -deep mountain tarns; and Ireland, that land of exaggera- tion, boasts of fish of the extraordinary weight of seventy or eighty pounds. In the spring of 1843, a pike was exhibited in London at a fish-monger's in Piccadilly, which was caught in some private preserve. He was immensely long, and was ticketed to weigh sixty-nine pounds and a half. How far such statements are to be believed one can scarcely determine, because no one seems to have taken the trouble properly to authenticate any very remarkable instance. Sometime in or about the year 1820, a pike, said to be thirty-six pounds in weight, was taken out of Whittlesea mere, in Huntingdonshire, and exhibited alive in a small brewing tub, at Trinity College, Cambridge, on the morning of the audit-day. Whether or not he was served up at the capital dinner which occurs on that occasion, we do not remember ; but perhaps the ravages of five-and-twenty years may have spared some old " blue-gown " who may have a more perfect recollection of the circumstances. But what are these pigmies, compared with the mon- ster whose carcase was preserved at Mannheim, and may be there yet for aught we know to the contrary? Part of the story has been a pet affair with most of the book- makers on fishing, from Walton downwards; but all of them have shrunk from the entire narration in sheer despair, it is presumed, of being able to stuff it down the throats of their readers. Monsieur Pesson Maisonneuve, however, in the third edition of his "Manuel du Pecheur," has no such foolish scrupulosity ; and so he ventures on the following story, citing Eleazar Bloch,* who published a * There is a splendid copy of Bloch's work in the library at Arras. THE PIKE. 47 magnificent work on Ichthyology, under the auspices of the then King of Prussia as his authority for the marvel. " In 1497, a person caught at Kaiserslautern, near Mann- heim, a pike which was nineteen feet in length, and which v/eighed three hundred and fifty pounds ! His skeleton was preserved for a long time at Mannheim. He carried round his neck a ring of gilded brass, which could enlarge itself by springs, and which had been attached to him by order of the emperor Frederick Barbarossa, two hundred and sixty-seven years before." Monsieur Pesson Maisonneuve concludes the anecdote with this apposite and truly pathetic explanation, "What a tremendous quantity of animals more weak and feeble than himself, he must have devoured, in order to nourish his enormous bulk, during such a long series of years ! " This is certainly a very queer-looking story; but it does not appear to be very intelligible on what grounds the fishing-book makers presume to withhold the bigger and better half of it. In March, if very warm, and in April, these fish leave their accustomed deep and quiet haunts, and seek for gulleys, creeks, broad ditches, and shallow reedy or pebbly places, in order to deposit their spawn, which they leave near the surface to be acted upon by the rays of the sun. It is said, but perhaps without much truth, that when thus obeying the impulses of nature, such is their lazy and absorbed condition, that they may be taken by the hand, much in the same way that trout are occasionally tickled. During this period, they should never be molested nor disturbed ; and indeed until this peculiar season is entirely over, the pike is not worth catching. When in season, he is a good, firm, and, cooked brown after the French 48 HINTS ON ANGLING. mode, a very fine, and indeed most excellent fish. When out of season, lie is about as filthy a compound as can well be imagined. September and October are fine months for pike-fish- ing ; but if the angler can stand the weather, the winter months are decidedly the best for large fish. Mr. Dalton's keeper, at Fillingham Castle, will tell you that the troller invariably catches the largest fish in his magnificent pond on sharp frosty days, when there is a thin film of ice spread over the surface of the water; and, in corroboration of this, we are in a condition to state, that a good pike and perch were taken by trolling, out of a large etany in the 77irzs,near St. Omer, in the Pas-de-Calais, on the sixteenth of January, in the very depth of the severe winter of this present year, 1845, the ice, which was very thick, being previously broken, to enable the angler to get his bait into the water. The pike, like some other fish, is supposed to be af- fected in his hues, by the complexion of the water in which he lives. However this may be, it is unquestion- ably true, that pikes taken out of canals, rivers, and rapid streams, are generally of a brighter colour, and more brilliant in their tints, than those which frequent deep pools and large weedy lakes. The latter are commonly much darker, and their sides tinged with a deep yellow; and some of those taken out of the marais in the Pas-de- Calais, are frequently quite tawny, and striped across the back and sides, like a Bengal tiger. The river and run- ning- water fish have, too, a finer flavour, and are in every respect, both for the sportsman and the cook, far superior to their brethren of the pond and the pool. Formerly, the pike was a scarce and expensive fish in England: and some curious anecdotes are collected in THE 'PERCH. 49 the fishing manuals illustrative of the fact. Now, how- ever, he is to be found in most of the British waters adapted to his nature and habits; and there is scarcely a private pond in the kingdom, of any respectable dimensions, which is not well stocked with these noble fish. The pike must be carefully excluded from trout- streams, otherwise the trout will very soon be gone. Superstition, which has touched everything connected with this world, more or less, has not spared the pike. A little bone in the form of a cross, which is said to be dis- coverable in the head of this fish, has been worn by the credulous, as a sort of talisman against witchcraft and enchantment. Medicine, too, has had its weaknesses on subjects of this kind. The heart of the pike is recommended to be eaten against the paroxysms of fevers ; his gall to be used as a liniment in affections of the eyes; his mandibulse dried into dust, against pleurisy; and little fishes found in his belly were prescribed, when dried, as a draught for poor persons in consumptions, etc., etc. These follies have passed away ; but the age which patronises the absur- dities and extravagancies of animal magnetism is scarcely in a condition to brag of its superiority in matters of this kind. There are various methods of catching the pike, which will be described in the proper place. The PERCH is a handsome, noble-looking fish, a bold, dashing biter, and a courageous resolute fellow when hooked, never yielding as long as he has any strength re- maining, but fighting bravely to the last. He is extremely 50 HINTS ON ANGLING. voracious when hungry, and will dash at any thing that comes in his way. Indeed, he will often follow a smaller one of his own species when hooked, and make every effort to devour it. In short, he is altogether, when large, one of the best fish for sport which the fresh waters contain. The perch is gregarious, and in the matter of taking- bait remarkably imitative ; so that when you have caught one, you should invariably remain some time in the same place, as there is every probability you will ultimately get all there are. This is so commonly understood among anglers, that it is quite a proverbial matter, known to every school-boy, and invariably acted upon by all the lovers of the gentle craft. In March and April, and perhaps in May, according to the season, the perch cast their spawn, so that they should be suffered to remain unmolested at least until July or August. In May and June they are out of condition, and are then of a pale bad colour and most execrable flavour, very different from the deep bright hues which make them like bars of gold in the water, and the sweet, firm flesh which distinguishes them in September and October. The perch is very prolific. Picot, of Geneva, opened a fish of a pound weight, the ovarium of which weighed a quarter of a pound, and contained 992,000 eggs. Their increase in favourable situations must consequently be enormous. This fish reaches a considerable size. Some authors affirm that he has attained a weight of nine or ten pounds. Perch have been occasionally caught in Whittlesea mere of six pounds ; and we ourselves took a few, five arid twenty years ago, which reached within a few ounces of four pounds each. During the severe winter of 1844 and THE PERCH. 51 1845, one was caught near St. Omer which was embedded in a lump of ice, and must have weighed five or six pounds. The frost had surprised him in some shallow place, and had literally frozen him up. The angler, however, must deem himself universally fortunate who succeeds in killing perch, whose average weight shall reach a pound and a half, or even a pound. Excellent sport is to be obtained with fish much below that weight; for, as he is a fearless dashing fellow, he will always afford the angler more amusement than any other fish twice his size, with the exception of the trout and the salmon, whose magnificent leaps and rushes, none who have ever ex- perienced them can possibly forget. The perch frequents deep weedy holes, the stone walls about locks and mills, reedy streams, where the water passes freely, and invariably those places where there is a constant or frequent rapid fall of water. If you can keep your line down, the stronger the stream in which you angle for perch the better; but more will be said on this matter in another place. Perch are to be met with almost everywhere. There / is scarcely a river in England, adapted to his nature and habits, in which he cannot be found. The lakes in the north of England are full of these fish ; and private ponds in which pike are preserved generally abound with them, as the jack will not eat the perch unless urged by extremity of hunger; and then he seldom recovers the effect of the perch's sharp and penetrating dorsal fin. The flesh of the perch was deemed salubrious by the old mediciners, and they were accustomed to prescribe two little round bones in his head, to be dissolved, and taken as a remedy for the " stone." There are various modes of cooking the perch. The best way with which 52 HINTS ON ANGLING. we are acquainted, is to fry him in butter, and then serve him up with rich hot shrimp sauce. In Scot- land they make what is called a " water-souchy" of him; but this is a flabby, wishy-washy affair altogether : the flavour of the fish is lost in that of the onion, and you wish in vain that you could lose the taste of the onion as easily. (Earp Ha The CARP is a very handsome fish, and is very highly esteemed for the table, especially on the continent. He is to be found in most of the ponds and rivers of Europe ; but he chiefly affects those waters which have a very gentle flow ; and in haunts of this kind, his flesh acquires the highest degree of delicacy and gout of which it is susceptible. Perhaps those fish are the best, both in colour and flavour, which are taken out of lakes or ponds of pure, limpid water, which is continually changed by a placid current perpetually drawing through them, the bottoms of which are covered with fine sand or pebbles. If, in addition to these advantages, the water which drains into these ponds or lakes from the surrounding lands, fall over a shingly or gravelly soil, the carp will be of splendid quality, and become a most delicious fish. The carp will live to a very great age ; and in favourable situations will attain a very large size. It is said that the big old carp which are to be found in the fosse of the chateau at Fontainebleau were put in, in the time of Francis I. Buffon speaks of carp in the fosse of Port- chartrain which were a hundred and fifty years old, and possessed all the vivacity and agility of ordinary fish. Others are spoken of by some authors which had attained the age of two hundred years. THE CARP. 53 We must, however, take all these stories about the ages of fish cum yrano salis. It is extremely difficult to obtain correct information on such a subject, especially as the evidence, from the very nature of the case, must neces- sarily be of a very loose and inadequate description. The weight of fish is a more tangible affair ; and on this point we cannot be deceived, if proper precautions be adopted. Carp, if only half the statements on record be true, will undoubtedly reach a very large size, especially in the north of Europe, where they seem to be highly prized, and very carefully protected. Pallas says that the Volga produces carp five feet long. " In 1711," says Eleazar Bloch, in his splendid work, " a carp was caught near Frankfort on the Oder, which was more than nine feet long, and three round, and which weighed seventy-pounds ! " In the lake of Zug, in Switzerland, one was taken which weighed ninety pounds. Monsieur Pesson Maisonneuve seems to think their size varies according to the places they inhabit, and the food they feed upon. " In France," says he, " they reach ten or twelve pounds; in Germany they become monstrous. They are taken in Pomerania thirty or forty pounds in weight; and in Prussia fifty pounds is a com- mon size ! " For our own part, we should like to see some of these extraordinary fish, but much fear we shall not be so fortunate. The carp spawn in May, and even in April, when the spring is forward and warm. They seek out quiet places covered with verdure, in which to deposit their esrers: and it is said that two or three males follow each Go ' female, in order to swim over and impregnate the deposit. At this season, carp which inhabit rivers and running streams, endeavour to get into more tranquil waters; and if, during their migration they meet with unexpected 54 HINTS ON ANGLING. obstacles, they are very resolute and determined in their efforts to overcome them; leaping, it is affirmed, after the fashion of the salmon, five or six feet in height, in order to accomplish their purpose. The carp multiplies prodigiously. A carp of half-a- pound in weight, has been found, on examination, to con- tain 237,000 eggs; one of a pound-and-a-half, 342,000; and one of nine-pounds, the enormous number of 62 1,000 eggs. The carp is very tenacious of life. Many anecdotes illustrative of this fact are on record. Indeed, in France it is no uncommon thing to transport them to great distances from one lake to another, wrapping them in fresh wet grass, and dipping them every twenty-four hours of the journey into fresh water for a few minutes to allow them to recruit their strength. In this manner, they are made to perform very long journeys with com- parative security, and scarcely any risk of loss. Carp are subject to many diseases. We ourselves have seen them covered with spots like the small -pox; and some of the large old ones are frequently nearly white, as if infected with a kind of leprous disorder. It is difficult to decide where are the favourite haunts of the carp; but that angler will always have the best chance of success, who selects the most retired arid quiet spots, and carefully excludes himself from observation. The carp is a cunning, shy fish, and requires very skilful management. The flesh of the carp is soft, fat, luscious, well-fla- voured, and nourishing. In Prusia, the head is preferred on account of the excellence of its flavour. The intestines also are esteemed delicacies, when eaten with pepper, ginger, and salt. THE TENCH. 55 The mediciners have dabbled with the carp, as well as with most other fish. His fat has been used as a molli- fying unguent to soothe the nerves, when suffering under what is termed " hot-rheumatism." His gall has been applied as a liniment for sore eyes. A small triangular stone, supposed to be discernible in the jaws of the carp, is said to act as a styptic when ground to a fine powder; and has been found efficacious in bleedings at the nose. And "above the eyes," says an old physician, "two little bones exist, semicircular in shape, which are dili- gently preserved by noble females against the lunatical disease." All this seems sufficiently absurd ; but the age which swallows Parr's pills, and pins its faith on the cold- water system, is scarcely in a condition to laugh at it. The carp is an excellent fish when satisfactorily cooked ; for accomplishing which, almost any cookery book will furnish a tolerable receipt. The soft-roed fish are much sought after by epicures as a delicate dish; and indeed, some writers attribute to them the property of restoring consumptive persons to perfect health. Ha The TENCH is a handsome thick fish, of a greenish- yellow colour, with a peculiarly greasy slippery skin. His form and appearance give one the idea of great rich- ness and delicacy ; and indeed, when properly cooked, he is really a very delicious fish. Tench are found in nearly all parts of Europe, but only in lakes, marais, ponds, and weedy rivers, where there is little or no current. They prefer stagnant muddy waters to any other; and during the severity of the winter, like eels, they bury themselves in the mud. In the hot days of summer and autumn, they are to be seen basking and 56 HINTS ON ANGLING. floundering about under the large leaves of the water-lily ; and in the deep etangs in the marais, in the Pas-de- Calais, we have seen them wallowing about in shoals amongst the weeds and lilies, beneath the hot burning sun, apparently regardless of the approach of our boat until we could almost touch them. These fish spawn late in the spring, or early in the summer, according to the lateness or forwardness of the season; and seek the most secluded and weedy places, clogged-up, as it were, with vegetation, to deposit their eggs, which are of a greenish colour, and very small. They are wondrously prolific, and increase prodigiously if undisturbed. In a female weighing about three pounds and a half, there were counted more than 297,000 eggs. When particularly well nurtured, and in a favourable situation, the tench will occasionally attain a weight of seven or eight pounds. This, however, is of rare occur- rence ; for, although the fish grows very fast, he will seldom be found to exceed two or three pounds. Like carp, tench are extremely tenacious of life, and may be carried very long journeys in wet grass, without the slightest fear of losing them. Many medicinal properties have been attributed to the tench ; but who will vouch for their authenticity ? It has been credited, that when cut into pieces and placed on the soles of the feet, his flesh will overcome the virulence of the plague, and dissipate the heat in the fiercest fevers; that, when applied alive to the brow, he will relieve pains in the head; that, planted on the nape of the neck, he will allay inflammations in the eyes; and that, when held in contact with the lower part of the body, he will effectually cure the jaundice. These notions are now exploded; but Walton seems to THE BARBEL. 57 be of opinion, that the Jewish physicians of his day were in possession of secrets of unquestionable value, derived from the supposed peculiar medicinal qualities of this fish, which had been handed down by a long tradi- tion from the days of Solomon. He gives no authority for this opinion ; but old Izaak's fancies even, must always appear respectable in the eyes of an enthusiastic angler. The tench has been called the physician of the pike; the latter being supposed to rub himself against its soft mollifying skin, when sick or wounded. This idea does not seem to rest on any sufficient foundation; and yet it is almost universally credited. The flesh of this fish is rich, luscious, and delicate, although somewhat muddy in its flavour; but the an- cients, who have afforded some illustrious instances of their familiarity with the gastronomic art, and their ap- preciation of the delicacies which nature supplies, con- sidered the tench very difficult of digestion, and held him in very slight estimation; and an old Silesian phy- sician, who seems to have shared their prejudices, says, " The tench is a vile neglected fish, very flabby and glu- tinous, bad of digestion, a food fit only for paupers and serfs." If he had ever eaten him, when under the influ- ence of Dr. Kitchener's receipt, he would have smacked his lips, and revoked his opinion altogether. barbel He The BARBEL is a well made, handsome, and powerful fish, very active and vigorous; quite the sort of fellow to try the strength of the angler's tackle, and the dexterity of his hand. He is very fond of rapid waters which run over a stony bottom, and will lie for a long time in a boiling current under shelving banks near old stone walls 58 HINTS ON ANGLING. and piles, or about sunken trees or old timber. In these sorts of places the larger fish are generally to be found ; and as the barbel dreads alike fiery heats or extreme cold, he commonly lies near the bottom, and haunts the deepest parts of the stream. The barbel is gregarious, and is to be found in many of the rivers of England; but the Trent and the Thames are perhaps better supplied with this fish than any other British streams. Stories have been told of the barbel having attained a weight of fifteen or twenty pounds ; but these are in- stances of very, very rare occurrence, as he seldom exceeds eight or ten pounds ; and even this is deemed a very large size and by no means usual. These fish spawn early in June. Walton says in April; but perhaps they vary ac- cording to seasons and situations. They deposit their eggs on the surface of stones in the narrowest and most rapid parts of the stream. Walton says they burrow under the stones to deposit their eggs ; but for once Walton is perhaps wrong The barbel, it is supposed by some authors, never casts spawn until in his fifth or sixth year. The barbel is a long-lived fish. His flesh is white and delicate in appearance; and, when cooked according to the receipt for stewing tench and carp, he is not altogether the most despicable of all fish, and might perhaps be eaten by a very hungry man. He will live four or five hours after he has been taken out of the water. This fish is supposed to possess the peculiar power of causing the water to bubble up on the surface above his head, when he makes his respirations. The eel is also believed to exhibit the same faculty; but as these air-bubbles may be accounted for in a more satis- THE BREAM. 59 factory manner, we may be permitted to doubt these notions altogether. The barbel takes his name from the beard or wattles which hang about his mouth ; and when he is young and very small, he is called in France " Barbillon." With these beards or wattles, says Walton, he is able to take such hold of weeds and moss, that the sharpest floods cannot move him from his position. He seems to have the power of rooting into the mud, and pig-like wallowing in the mire and weeds, at the bottom of deep holes and under overhanging banks. This fish feeds on flies, bees, bugs, wasps, maggots, worms, slugs, snails, and all similar kinds of bait; but anglers have invented or adopted various other baits to entrap this wary shy-biting fish, which will be noticed in the proper place. The eggs of the barbel are supposed to be injurious; and an opinion once prevailed in the north of Europe, that they who partook of them copiously would " shrink up in great danger of life." This, perhaps, is an exaggera- tion ; but there can be no doubt that the spawn of all fresh- water fish is more or less pernicious. iSrcam Ha 33reme. The BREAM is a great, flat, coarse, ugly fish, strong in the water, but utterly detestable on the table. The French, it is true, are of a different opinion, and hold him in rather high estimation. All we can say is, *' So much for taste." The French gastronomes, however, seldom make mistakes of this description. This fish frequents still places in deep placid waters; but prefers the retirement of ponds and lakes where the water is still, the place undisturbed, and the bottom weedy and muddy. 60 HINTS ON ANGLING. The bream is to be found in most of the slow still rivers of England, and sometimes attains a very large size : he is then very much like a pair of bellows in shape, and not very superior, we apprehend, in flavour. In the north of Europe, this fish has been known to reach the weight of twenty pounds ; and, in 1749, there were taken at a single draught, out of a large lake near Nordkiaeping in Sweden, five thousand bream, the aggregate weight of which was eighteen thousand pounds. We have ourselves caught them four and five pounds in weight, and have heard of other people catching them still larger; but this size is by no means general. The bream spawn late in June or early in July, and at that season seek out the level shelving sides, or the muddy bottoms, of rivers well grown with weeds. Each female is accompanied by three or four males. They multiply very rapidly; and, indeed, 137,000 eggs have been counted in the ovarium of a single female. During this season, it is said, the males are covered with little tubercles like the small-pox, which disappear when these processes are over. " At this season," says a French author, " they make a great noise as they swim in numerous flocks ; and yet they distinguish the sound of bells, or the tambour, or any other analogous tones, which sometimes frighten them, retard them, disperse them, or drive them into the nets of the fishermen." Surely, all this must be purely fanciful ! Our author gives no authority for the statement, neither does he say that he ever witnessed the circumstance himself. The bream grows very fast, and is remarkably tenacious of life when taken out of the water during cold weather. He can then be transported alive to a great distance, provided he be carefully wrapped up in snow, with a THE CHUB. 61 morsel of bread steeped in alcohol placed in his mouth. This is a plan successfully practised in some parts of France. There are said to be three or four varieties of bream in the waters of the Seine. The fishermen in that river give the name of " Henriots" to the young fry, and that of " B remotes" to the middle-sized fish. Bloch says, " This fish is little esteemed; and still less when he has been taken out of muddy waters, which give him a most detestable flavour." Perchance the receipt for cooking tench might enable a very hungry school-boy to swallow a morsel or two; but even then, perhaps, it would be necessary to abandon both sight and recollection. OTfwb Ha OTjjebanne. The CHUB is a strong, compact, but rather clumsily built fish, well adapted to afford capital sport to the angler; but is a very miserable affair in the hands of the cook. Walton gives a receipt which he says will make him eatable, but who will be at the trouble of trying it? The French, who understand this department as well as, or perhaps better, than any other people under the sun, pro- nounce him a villanous fish; and they are most certainly right. His flesh is woolly and watery, and has a nasty sweetness about it which is absolutely nauseous. Perhaps the best mode of serving up the chub, would be to imitate the Irish manager's method of performing Hamlet send up the richest receipt you can get, hot and piquante, omitting the fish ! The chub spawns about the time of Easter, and is probably very prolific. His eggs, which are yellow, and about the size of a grain of poppy seed, are deposited on 62 HINTS ON ANGLING. the gravel in very shallow water. The operation is supposed to occupy a period of about eight days. Most of the rivers of England contain chub. He haunts deep, quiet holes, under overhanging banks; fre- quents the bottoms of old walls, and deep retired nooks, where piles and old posts stick up out of the bottom, and yet he likes occasionally to fight against strong rushing streams, and to contend with the most rapid waters. The chub of the river is far finer and more active than his brother of the pond or lake; indeed, he is not often found in the latter, unless they communicate easily and freely with some river, or constantly open current. This fish attains a considerable size. It is said, he will sometimes weigh six or seven pounds; and in France he has been known to reach a weight of ten pounds. Fish of this size, however, must be very scarce; as few sports- men can boast of having seen them so large. A chub was caught in the Thames in the month of May, 1844, by a friend of ours, which weighed four pounds. He was a very strong active fish, shot across the river like an arrow on feeling himself hooked, and fought well for a full hour, before he could be got out of the water. He was caught with a common gut line ; and therefore required consider- able indulgence, before he could be overcome. This was considered a remarkable fish. Chub are gregarious, and in hot weather may be seen basking on the surface of the water over some deep hole in considerable numbers. The moment they become sensible that they are observed, they sink down in an instant, being perhaps, with scarcely an exception, the shyest of all river fish. He (ffiarfcon. The ROACH is supposed to be so called, on account of the redness of his fins. He is a poor mean fish as far as eating goes; but he is a handsome, strong fish, and will afford the angler capital sport when he rises at the fly, which he commonly does about the months of August and Sep- tember, both boldly and freely. Roach are gregarious. They love limpid and clear waters, and yet are to be found in still and muddy rivers and ponds. They frequent almost all the ponds, rivers, and lakes in Europe; and in some places are incon- ceivably numerous. Many of the rivers and ponds in England are full of them ; and in France they are very abundant everywhere, particularly in the neighbourhood of Paris. In the marais of the Pas-de-Calais, and about iVruimc there are millions of them. In some countries, in the north of Europe, and particularly on the banks of the Oder, they are so plentiful that they are commonly used for manuring the land; and Bloch assures us, that before the marais on the Oder were drained, such enor- mous quantities were constantly caught, that they supplied the neighbouring villages with abundance of provender on which to fatten their pigs. Roach spawn about June, and, Walton says rightly, may be fished for a fortnight after that process is accom- plished. They cast their spawn in narrow, weedy, grassy places, and are very prolific. In the ovarium of an or- dinary sized roach, were counted 125,000 eggs. At a certain season the spawning season roach have been observed to migrate like the salmon, trout, carp, etc. " In the spring," says a French author, u the 64 HINTS ON ANGLING. roach mount up the rivers in a very singular order. The males and females separate themselves so as to form dis- tinct troops. One troop of males takes the lead, a troop of females follows without mingling with the other; and at last a second troop of males closes the march, They go very close together; and if any accident separates them on their route, they quickly re-form their battalions, and resume their march when the danger is passed." We never noticed this habit ourselves; we never heard of any sportsman who ever did; and we never before saw any account of it in any book; it may, however, be true for all that, although it savours strongly of the fanciful. The roach attains a large size. They are said to have been killed in England of the weight of two pounds ; but in the French waters they reach a larger size than this, and give the angler a good deal of trouble, as they require delicate tackle to deceive them. The roach is by no means the stupid reckless fish some represent him to be ; on the contrary, he demands a fair amount of skill and caution, and affords very respectable sport, when of good size and in full season. There is a fish of the roach species, called in England the RUDD, which is very numerous in the waters of France, and is there designated, "ROACH-CARP." Walton seems to think the rudd lies between the roach and the bream. Other writers declare it to be a separate fish altogether; but most probably it is a genuine cross between the roach and the carp. In France, this fish attains a great size. He abounds in the fosses round the fortified towns in the north of France, is a bold biter, and a very strong active fish. He is rather better eating than the roach ; but few anglers would catch him for the THE DACE. 65 sake of cooking him. After all, the best use to which either the one or the other can be put, is to make a bait of him for the voracious pike. Bace Ha Fcnboige ou Baft. The DACE is a well-made, salmon-shaped, strong-built, handsome fish, of a bright silvery hue. He frequents clear rapid waters, and is very frequently found in the same streams with the trout. It makes but little difference to him whether the water be deep or shallow, provided it be bright and tolerably rapid. These fish are gregarious, and, in favourable waters and well-adapted positions, are to be found in very large shoals. They are found to inhabit all suitable waters in nearly every part of Europe, and are very numerous in the Pas-de-Calais, and many other parts of France. Early in the summer the dace casts its spawn, and is very prolific. He multiplies with enormous rapidity ; and the rather so, that he is enabled to avoid numerous ene- mies both on land and in the water, from the remarkable rapidity with which he swims. This fish deposits an immense quantity of eggs of a dirty whitish colour, and feeds freely on worms, gnats, and flies. Other bait, how- ever, will tempt him, as we shall show in the proper place. The angler may enjoy first-rate sport with the dace, because he is bold and dashing, and for his size a very strong fish ; he fights hard, and dies game. The cook, perhaps, would rather not be troubled with him ; but as he does not seem to be in much request, no, not even with bream-eaters, receipts for cooking him are scarcely necessary : and yet, when fresh and fried nicely in butter, he is a capital addition to the breakfast-table. F 66 HINTS ON ANGLING. CSfutrgeon He (Sottfon. The GUDGEON is a very handsome, active, well-shaped little fish; most delicious in flavour when properly cooked, and deservedly considered very recherche by the gas- tronomes of France. This fish is to be found in almost all the rivers of Eng- land, and indeed of Europe. He prefers running waters and rapid curling streams which flow over a pebbly or sandy bottom, although he will live and thrive in lakes and ponds through which a gentle draw of water continually passes. The gudgeon is supposed to spawn about the month of May. "Walton says they breed two or three times a year. This does not appear to be very clearly established ; but the prodigious rate at which these fish increase, would seem to lend a certain degree of probability to the notion. A French writer says, " They pass their winter in the lakes and large ponds, and in the spring remount the rivers, where they deposit their spawn on pebbles and stones. This operation is, with the gudgeon, a very laborious affair, and the fish is frequently occupied an entire month in the difficult process. Towards the autumn the gudgeons gain the lakes." This does not appear to be the general opinion, neither is it our own ; but Walton, who after all is a very high authority, seems to entertain some such notion of the migratory habits of this fish, although his language is vague and uncertain. The gudgeons, undoubtedly, multiply prodigiously, and in certain favourable situations are to be found in immense quantities. The waters of the Pas-de-Calais abound with this fish, and they are to be caught freely in a small rapid stream within the very walls of St. Omcr, as well as in the surrounding running waters. THE BLEAK. 67 Gudgeons are used in some parts of France to stock lakes, ponds, and rapid streams, as food for pike, eels, and trout. When the gudgeon is well cleaned and wiped perfectly dry, rubbed over with egg and bread crumbs, fried crisp in butter, and served up with hot melted butter, and new well-buttered hot household bread, he is a very delicious fish. At the breakfast-table, when in this condition, he is inimitable. The French have many modes of cooking him; but we think none better than this. 23Uak U'&ble ou The BLEAK abound in nearly all the rivers and fresh waters of Europe; but they are to be found in prodigious numbers in the Caspian sea, from whence, according to some authors, they were originally introduced into Europe. This fish is very active, handsome, and well formed, and when first taken out of the water, shines like a bar of silver. His beautiful sparkling scales are used by artists to give to the mock pearls the beauty and brilliancy of those of the East. The white scales only are employed in this in- genious process. The bleak spawns in May or June and multiplies pro- digiously. It is well that he does so ; for he has many ene- mies. Waterfowl are said to prefer this fish to any other. These merry fish are to be seen constantly in fine warm days playing on the surface of the water; but they in- finitely prefer rushing, powerful streams, in the middle or on the borders of which, they are to be caught in the greatest quantities, and with the most surprising rapidity. There is a very fine kind of bleak in the fosses beneath the ramparts of Bergues and St. Omer, in the Pas-de- Calais, and similar places in the north of France, which are as big as ordinary herrings. 68 HINTS ON ANGLING. There are many modes of catching this fish, which will be considered in the proper place : suffice it to say here, the best bait for him is a gentle, the very worst, a worm. The bleak is a very excellent fish, when cooked accord- ing to our mode of frying gudgeons. Cooks do not like him , because he gives them too much trouble in the preparation. or Walton calls this fish the EuFFE-PERCH; and it is known to all the school-boys in England under the familiar appellation of the " Tommy Kuffe," at whose unfortunate expense they often enjoy a vast deal of rather cruel fun. They stick the strong sharp fin on his back into a large cork, and in this fashion launch him into the water. The cork prevents him from sinking; and so poor " Tommy" swims about on the very surface of the water until some accident, or extra exertion, rids him of the cork, or some water- rat puts him out of his trouble. These fish are found in almost all the waters in England, and roam about in large shoals. The ruffe fearlessly fre- quents the haunts of the pike and the perch; and, indeed, is generally found in company with the perch, secure under the protection of his strong dorsal fin, which pre- sents an obstacle too formidable to be encountered by the most voracious of his fresh- water brethren. The ruffe prefers deep water which flows gently over a clear sandy bottom. He is an excellent biter, greedy and bold, and will afford the young angler very good sport, as he fights hard, and, for his size, shows a great deal of game. This fish spawns in May and is very prolific. The ruffe is a very delicate, sweet-flavoured fish, and cooked after the mode which we have recommended for dressing gudgeon, makes a very respectable dish. Nine THE EEL. 69 times out of ten these sorts of small fish are far preferable, in point of sweetness and flavour, to the larger ones ; but the cooks uniformly run them down, because they are troublesome to prepare for the frying-pan. lEel H'&nguille. Few fish are better known than the EEL. He frequents all the rivers and waters of Europe, where the cold is not too severe; and he is to be met with on the most sump- tuous as well as on the most frugal tables, the food alike of the rich and the poor. But common, and apparently well-known as he is, no fish has been the subject of more absurd errors, ridiculous prejudices, and puerile conceits. The haunts of this fish are familiar to every angler. He inhabits all kinds of waters, ponds, lakes, ditches, trout-streams, rivers. No water is too dirty for him, and none too pure. He thrives in the muddiest holes, and grows fat among the stones of the mountain torrent. A fresh-water fish in all his habits, yet if he gets into the salt-water, he shows little anxiety to leave it again; and though it evidently affects his colour, he grows pro- digiously in it, and gets as fat as butter. No matter where he may be fishing with a sunk bait, the experi- enced angler is never surprised when he pulls out an eel. In short this fish is almost universal, and his attachment to one place rather than another, is highly problematical. Wherever he can get food, there he is; nay, indeed, he has been sometimes found in situations, where, to all appearance, he could get none. Various have been the opinions about the mode in which eels are generated. Writers on fishing, one after another, recapitulate the old opinions, and nearly in the same words. We are told that one ancient author supposed 70 HINTS ON ANGLING. they were born of the mud ; another, from little bits scraped off the bodies of large eels, when they rubbed themselves against stones ; another, from the putrid flesh of dead animals thrown in the water ; another, from the dews which cover the earth in May; another, from the water alone, and so forth. All these notions, however, are now exploded, and the process more satisfactorily explained. The following statement wears a reasonable appearance, and will account for the story from Bowlker, quoted in " The Angler's Sure Guide." The eel proceeds from an egg. The egg is hatched in the body of the female as in fish of the "ray" species. A slight pressure on the lower part of the body of the female facilitates the egress of the young ones. But in order that the eggs may be capable of being hatched, there must of necessity be some intercourse with the male. This, we may presume, is accomplished in the same manner as amongst snakes. The eggs are of course more or less numerous in different fish. It sometimes happens that the female eels disembarass themselves of their eggs, before they are hatched; but this must occur very seldom, because it has never yet been clearly ascer- tained where, in such cases, the eels deposit them. Now, this, which is an abridgment of the more elaborate account of a French author, seems to be a plain and rational account of the matter, and is, in all pro- bability, not far from the truth. Many anecdotes have been told about the nocturnal migrations of eels. The fact of eels having been found in detached ponds which had not been stocked with them, has given rise to many marvellous notions, and many extraordinary conjectures. It is not at all improbable that eels may wander about at night amongst the long THE EEL. 71 dewy grass, in search of slugs, worms, mice, etc., etc., and it is not at all unlikely that they may, during such rambles, stray away into other waters; but still, nobody appears to have seen them under such circumstances. The belief is indeed, almost universal, but we have never yet seen, or heard of, a well-attested statement of the fact. There is, however, another, and a perfectly natural and rational way of accounting for eels being found in im- probable or unexpected situations; and as the fact on which it is founded, can be verified by unexceptionable witnesses, we do not hesitate to advance the opinion. In the month of July, in the year 1844, a party of ladies and gentlemen residing at St. Omer, in the Pas-de- Calais, took an evening stroll along the road towards Calais, immediately after a short, sharp, summer shower. When they reached the avenue beyond the gate of the town, they were surprised to find the road under the trees thickly studded with small frogs, about the size of large garden spiders. Some were hopping about, splashed and covered with wet dust; some were crushed under the feet of the passengers, and more were dropping from the thick foliage of the overhanging lime trees, yet wet with the summer shower. These circumstances were witnessed by numerous respectable persons, who, taking the locality and other considerations into account, unanimously adopted the opinion what other could they arrive at? that these little animals had been drawn up into the clouds from some neighbouring marais, and dropped again amongst the trees and long grass, when it dis- charged itself of its contents. Now, if frogs can be transported in this way, why not eels also? Whoever has noticed the tribes of little eels about two inches long, and as thin as a knitting kneedle, which, at certain seasons 72 HINTS ON ANGLING. of the year, swarm in millions about the doors and walls of locks and sluices, in their progress up the rivers, can have no difficulty in believing that such minute animals could be as easily carried from one water to another by a powerful natural agency, as the little frogs which studded the avenue at St. Omer. How are the islands in the great southern ocean constructed and peopled? The coral insect raises his labours above the wave. The sea heaves her sands upon his work. The birds drop their excrements, containing probably seeds which still retain the principle of vitality. The tempests which sweep over those vast wastes of water, come laden with insects, and small reptiles, and the slight germs of animal and vege- table life. The storm-driven savage runs his vagrant canoe into its shallow bays for shelter and security; and the adventurous European is one day- surprised by dis- covering the fertile and peopled isle, where his chart speaks of nothing but interminable waves. All this goes on every day ; and yet we anglers are conjecturing and theorising, how a few little eels, as light as thistle down, can be transported from one water to another, at a dis- tance, it may be, of perhaps a few hundred yards ! * Eels increase in numbers most prodigiously. They will also reach a very large size. In Italy a magnificent * The bishop of Norwich recently read a paper to some scientific society on this very subject. He had noticed some little eels in the thatch of a cottage, and thence inferred that the spawn had been deposited on the reeds before they were cut, and had been subsequently vivified by the sun's rays. Now, reeds are always thoroughly dried before they are used as thatch ; and this process, we apprehend, would destroy the vitality of the spawn which the bishop seems to think eels deposit. Perhaps his lordship, if these hints should meet his eye, may be induced to prefer the solution in the text. THE EEL. 73 country for the angler they are taken, it is said, of the weight of twenty pounds. In Albania, they are stated to be occasionally as thick as a man's thigh. And some writers have affirmed that in Prussia, they have been sometimes caught ten or twelve feet in length. We our- selves, have often seen them of five or six pounds in weight ; and fish of this size are by no means uncommon in the waters of the Pas-de-Calais, and other departments of France. The eel is a fish of very slow growth ; but, as a set-off against this, he seems to be endowed with the gift of very long life. Writers on fishing generally limit him to a period of five or six years; but a French author who speaks with the greatest confidence on the subject, says, " Experience has proved that the eel will live for a cen- tury. How, otherwise, can the prodigious increase of these animals be explained ; since it can be demonstrated that the females do not breed before they are twelve years old. The eel increases until his ninety-fourth year. Each female therefore can produce during a period of eighty-two years; and this satisfactorily accounts for the enormous quantity of eels to be found in the waters which are adapted for them." Our author gives no authority for these positive state- ments ; but one thing is now pretty certain ; this fish must be longer lived than Walton (following Bacon) and others have supposed him to be. Ten years of life, the limit assigned by these authors, with his very slow growth, will not suffice to account for his extraordinary increase. In all probability, the French writer, if not minutely correct, is still not very far from the truth. The eel is exceedingly voracious, and a most indis- criminate feeder. Nothing can be too delicate, and few 74 HINTS ON ANGLING. things too nasty for his ravenous appetite. Many years ago, we were present when some schoolboys caught a very large one, which was wriggling about in a pool of water, just above a mill, after the stream had been suddenly run off. Two of them pulled off their clothes, and after a long struggle the fish being so strong and slippery that they could scarcely hold him they succeeded in bundling him on the bank. To our surprise he had a large half-decayed water-rat in his mouth. One-half he had succeeded in swallowing ; but the other was too big for his throat, and remained hanging out of his jaws. The rat was rapidly decomposing ; and in a day or two, if the boys had not spoiled the feast, he would probably, like the boa, have completed his meal. Many instances of his voracity have been recorded, but this anecdote we can vouch for. Several individuals are still alive who were present on the occasion ; and should these pages meet their eye, their memory, like our own, will perchance leap back with a feeling of pleasure over a period of thirty years. Eels are very abundant in the Seine. In that river there are several varieties of the eel, some of them dis- tinguished for their wondrous voracity; and which de- stroy vast quantities of smelts, shads, and bream. One species is so astonishingly ravenous, that he has obtained from the inhabitants the name of the " dog-eel." The gluttony and voracity of this variety are said to be most extraordinary. The flesh of the eel is delicate, white, firm, and, when fed and well-nurtured in favourable waters, truly de- licious. He was interdicted as an article of food by the Jewish law-giver on perfectly intelligible grounds, quite unconnected with his good or bad qualities, as an article THE EEL. 75 of food; and Numa forbad him to be used in tlie sacri- fices which were offered to the gods, on grounds equally unintelligible, unless we admit the very probable con- jecture that he blindly imitated the Hebrew legislator. The mediciners of later times have denounced him as an unwholesome and indigestible fish ; but malgre the ordi- nances of legislation and the dicta of physicians, he will continue to be gobbled up, by all who like a good thing to the end of time. Either fried like a gudgeon, as we have prescribed elsewhere, or served up in the receipt which we have suggested for cooking tench, he is a most admirable fish; seldom equalled, never excelled. A particularly fine sort is caught in the river Nene; and at the Angel at Peterborough, in former days, stewed eels were to be obtained in perfection. The last time we dined there, we fancied they had lost the art ; but we were rather in a hurry, and perhaps scarcely allowed the cook sufficient time. There is a mode of cooking them called spatch-cocking, or spitch-cocking. This is a very capital method and any of the cookery books will explain the manner how. Collared also, he is a delicious fish, and makes a most piquant addition to the breakfast-table. We have tasted him so good under this sort of discipline, that we cannot refrain from recommending the illustrious process. The eel served in this way, and sauced with a little pepper and vinegar, would make the Pope himself the best maigre dinner his holiness ever dreamt of. This fish was in high estimation among the ancients; and the ladies of Greece and Rome were in the habit of wearing bracelets and other ornaments made in the form of this fish, the head and tail forming the clasps. Modern 76 HINTS ON ANGLING. artists who affect to imitate the ancients in this matter, construct these ornaments in the shape of adders, vipers, and other snakes, forgetting that, in nine cases out of ten, the eel, and not the snake, is designated on the antique ornaments and bijouterie which time has be- queathed us. The eel is subject to a disorder of a leprous character. When under the influence of this disease, he is mottled with numerous little white spots, which give him an un- healthy, and, indeed, a disgusting appearance. Hamprep Ua Hamprofe. The LAMPREY is exactly like an eel in form, and also in colour ; but he possesses some remarkable characteristics which are peculiar to himself. Close to each eye he has two ranges of small orifices, four on one side, five on the other, and, independent of these, behind each eye he has seven more through which he effects his respirations. He is slippery like the common eel, and swims with great force and activity, being a remarkably muscular fish. He possesses the faculty of attaching himself to stones, etc., by means of his mouth, which, from the elasticity of his lips and the strength of his crooked teeth, acts as a kind of sucker and enables him to hold on to stones and posts, etc., with singular firmness. A lamprey of three pounds for he reaches a larger size than writers on angling com- monly imagine has been known thus to lift a weight of about twelve pounds. On account of this peculiarity, he is denominated by some naturalists the " Petromyson" or " Suckstone." The lamprey spawns in the spring, and ascends the rivers and streams for this necessary purpose. The eggs of the lamprey are about the size of a grain of mustard- THE CHAR. 77 seed, of an orange colour, and are deposited in very con- siderable quantities. These fish have been known to attain a weight of more than six pounds. Their flesh is difficult of digestion, and is said to have killed Henry I., who was very fond of them. The lamprey is very tenacious of life, and will live nearly as long out of water as an eel. He is to be found in lakes and ponds during the winter, and in rivers dnring the summer. He frequents some of the English waters, and is to be found in most parts of France. Those of the Loire and the Seine are held in the highest estimation. There are several kinds of lamprey. That called " seven-eyes" is the most common now in the waters of England; but this is not the fish that killed the king. Writers on fishing are in the habit of attributing this exploit to the small lamprey which is at present to be found in England; but this is a mistake, for the larger species which seems to be banished from our island, was the true regicide. (ZTfiar. The CHAR is a fish which, from his being confined to the lakes in the north of England and Scotland, is not familiar to sportsmen generally; and indeed very little seems to be known about him at all. He is a handsome fish, spotted like the trout, and attains a very fair size Walton says fifteen or sixteen inches in length and is of an admirable flavour. His habits are enveloped in considerable obscurity, and his admitted rarity renders him an object of comparatively little interest to the brethren of the angle. Epicures attach a high value to this fish; and " potted char" is constantly advertised in the newspapers as a 78 HINTS ON ANGLING. standard delicacy. How it is made is another matter; but as few tilings in England can escape adulteration, most probably the char undergoes the profitable process. Bleak and sprats as well as sardines have long since been converted into anchovies; and as long as John Bull will consent to pay for names instead of things, so long will the concoctors of sauces continue to fleece him, in common with all the other harpies who prey upon his enormous gullibility. Hoacj) Ha Hocjje. The LOACH is a curious-looking fish, having all the appearance of being a cross between the eel and the barbel. He seems to avoid the more calm and tranquil water, and to prefer the curling streams of small rivers which occa- sionally rush over pebbly and gravelly bottoms. The loach is covered with a viscous matter, and really has scales, although they are scarcely visible; he is re- markable also for the barbillons or wattles which hang from his upper lip. This fish can be transported alive to a very great dis- tance, provided the water in the vessel in which he is con- veyed be continually agitated, and a cool season, such as the middle of autumn, be selected for the occasion. Linnaeus has left it on record that Frederick I., king of Sweden, procured these fish from Germany, and naturalised them in his own country. By a careful atten- tion to the precautions just mentioned, they were enabled to survive the long and difficult journey. The flesh of the loach is considered a great delicacy, especially in autumn, and also in the spring when he is full of spawn. At these two periods he is preferred by the French gastronomes to all other fish ; and these most THE MINNOW THE SMELT. 79 competent judges affirm that there is nothing comparable to him when he has been killed by immersion in wine or milk. In matters of the mouth the French really are a refined people; but this seems to be refining with a vengeance. Loaches spawn in the later spring and breed freely. They will live a very long time in small trunks, provided they are placed in the very middle of a rapid stream. jJWinnofo He Feron. Walton calls this fish the PENK, which has been corrupted into pink, and in Ireland into pinkeens; and if this were the only liberty which some fishing-book makers have taken with dear old Izaak, there would be nothing much to complain of on that score at least. The minnow is a remarkably handsome little fish, beautifully coloured and shaped, as exquisite in his graceful proportions as the salmon himself. He casts his spawn at the commencement of summer; multiplies prodigiously and rapidly, but is supposed erroneously perhaps not to possess the power of spawning until arrived at the age of four years. He frequents limpid waters and rapid currents, and generally swims near the surface when undisturbed. He delights in rivers with pebbly or sandy bottoms, and is invariably to be found in the same streams with the trout. The flesh of the minnow is very delicate, white, wholesome, tender, and of a delicious flavour ; especially when treated according to our receipt for cooking the gudgeon. He can be fished for at all seasons, winter or summer. This fish lives a very short time after he has been taken out of the water. 80 HINTS ON ANGLING. H'lEperlan. 2tf)* jplounta He Camlet. These fish are treated of in some fishing books, but, as they are in fact salt-water fish, and but of little impor- tance to the angler, they are scarcely legitimate objects of consideration in a work like the present. SMELTS are as good fish for the table as the sea produces. They require very little cleaning, but they must be rubbed perfectly dry. When they are smothered with egg and bread crumbs, and crisply fried in pure dripping, and served up with rich hot melted butter, they are without any exception the sweetest fish in the world. They are so delicate that the happy epicure may gobble them up, heads and tails and all, regardless of bones. Angling for smelts must be a very sorry business. We never heard of any body but Londoners attempting such sport ; but cockneys are a peculiar race, and sometimes do very funny things. STICKLEBACKS are nasty little fishes, with sharp fins on their backs, or rather sharp spines, which you will do well to avoid touching. Formerly they were very numerous in some parts of Lincolnshire ; and Pennant tells a story, which has been carefully copied by some writers on these subjects, about their utility as a valuable manure. The agriculturists of Lincolnshire perhaps the best in the kingdom occasionally spread the sprat over their land, near the coast, as a rich unguent previous to a certain de- scription of cropping ; but the men who expend thousands a year in bones, and freight large vessels with guano, FLOUNDERS. 81 would laugh at the luckless wight who should impute to them the wretched practices of their predecessors in the undrained fens. Some writers on fishing have described the tackle and baits best adapted for attacking and killing this miserable little fish ; but our notion is, that the angler who can waste his time and disgrace his art in such a pursuit, ought decidedly to have the pleasure and honor of in- venting his own apparatus. FLOUNDERS are, strictly speaking, salt-water fish; but they will invariably work up into fresh water, when- ever they have the opportunity. The best places to catch these fish are the sides of rivers when the tide is making ; and the mouths of fresh-water sluices, which discharge their streams into the salt-water. On the salt-water side of such sluices, when the tide is out, and a sharpish fresh is running through the sluice doors, the flounders assemble in vast numbers, in order to revel in the fresh water, or work their way through the partially opened doors of the sluice. If the angler will cast into this running water a strong line armed with two perch-hooks, one above another, with a bullet attached to keep them down ; and if he will bait these with fresh boiled shrimps the heads and tails of which he has previously pinched off, the flounders will keep him sufficiently busy, and will try both his tackle and skill. In this manner we have caught hundreds ; some of which were of a very large size. This mode of fishing for the flounder is very common in some parts of Lincolnshire, and is by far the most suc- cessful method of dealing with him, as well as with most other flat fish. Such fish as these, after all, can seldom interest the G 82 HINTS ON ANGLING. angler unless lie happen to reside near the coast ; and, strictly speaking, they scarcely appertain to a work of this description. Still a casual resident at a watering place in England; or a sojourner at Gravelines, Dunkirk, Calais, Ostend, or any other continental coast-town may perhaps find these few brief hints of some use to him. PART II. MATERIALS FOR ANGLING. WE come now to the second part of our work, which treats on the materials of angling the instruments and contrivances by which fish are usually caught and the best modes of using and adapting them for different kinds of fish. This is an important division of the sportsman's know- ledge; and no small portion of his enjoyment is derivable from his thorough acquaintance with it in all its various branches. We supply the following list of articles for the full equipment of a first-rate angler's establishment : at the same time, we by no means intend to insinuate that the real sport of the genuine enthusiast is necessarily dependant on such a copious catalogue. Where economy or necessity demands a more curtailed stock of materials, the energetic and zealous angler will prosecute his favourite amusement with ardour ; and invention and contrivance will, for the most part, supply the place of a more formal and osten- tatious assortment of implements : Rods for salmon and trout-fishing, trolling, worm and fly-fishing, spinning the minnow and bleak. 84 HINTS ON ANGLING. Hair lines, Indian weed, plaited silk and hair, and patent and other lines for trolling. Reels for running tackle. Hooks for trolling on wire or gimp, for the gorge or snap. Minnow, gudgeon and bleak tackle, and baiting needles of various sizes. Hooks tied on gimp, hair, and gut, of various sizes. Loose hooks of all sizes. Paternosters for perch-fishing. Cobbler's- wax, sewing silk, and a few balls of small twine. Floats of various sizes, and plenty of spare caps for floats. Split shot and bored bullets of various sizes. Disgorger, clearing ring and drag. Landing-net, a gaff, and kettle for live bait. Gentle-box, and bags for worms. A fishing-basket, creel, or game pouch. A pair of pliers, a pair of scissors, and a good pocket knife, both with large and small blades. A parchment book of artificial flies. A parchment book for general tackle. A book for containing the various articles requisite for making artificial flies. The following list of materials is necessary for this purpose : Cock and hen hackles of all colours; as red, ginger, black, dun, olive-grizzle, and stone-colour. Peacock's herl, copper-coloured, green, and brown. Black ostrich's herl. Fowl's spotted feathers. The feathers of the turkey, the partridge, the grouse, ptarmigan, pheasant, woodcock, snipe, dotterel, landrail, starling, golden plover, common pce-wit, wild mallard, FISHING-RODS. 85 bustard, sea-swallow, wren, jay, blackbird, thrush, blue pigeon, silver pheasant, parrot, and the tame and wild duck. The fur of the mole, water-rat, and hare's ears. Mohair, dyed of all colours. Fine French sewing silk of all colours. Flos silk of all colours. German wools of all colours. Silk twist, cobbler's and bees' wax. A pair of pliers, a pair of fine-pointed scissors, a small slide vice, and a few fine pointed strong dubbing needles. Silk- worm gut, from the finest to the strongest; and salmon gut single and twisted. Lengths of the white and sorrel hairs of stallions' tails. And lastly, a variety of fly-hooks. Fancy, of course, exercises a considerable influence over all enumeration of this kind, even when furnished by professed sportsmen. Some anglers, for instance, prefer the London hooks; some the Kirby sneck; and some must have the true Limerick bend. The best plan perhaps is to have a respectable assortment of all ; for in particular situations, and during peculiar seasons, they have all their individual advantages. A good FiSHiNG-RoD is one of the angler's most im- portant instruments : indeed he is nobody without it. The qualities which a rod must possess will, of course, vary with the nature of angling. There need be no great difference between a salmon and a trout rod for fly-fishing, except you fish in very wide streams, or on 86 HINTS ON ANGLING. lakes in open boats. In such cases we would recom- mend a good double-handed rod, from sixteen to eighteen feet in length, as the best that could be made for salmon- fishing. A rod of this size, and for this specific purpose, ought to have a free and equal spring in it, from the but to the top. This is of vital importance in dealing with large fish. A single-handed fly rod ought to be from twelve to fifteen feet in length. It should be as elastic as possible, and constructed of such materials as will unite lightness and elasticity with durability and strength. An expe- perienced dexterous fly-fisher can never get hold of a rod which is too light and springy; although a rather stiffish weapon is better for a beginner. The most beauti- fully elastic rods we have ever seen were made of ash and lance wood. All rods with metallic root-pieces must necessarily be of uneven suppleness, although of late years the manufacture of this description of rod has very materially improved, with reference to this radical defect. The salmon and trout fly-fisher, ought always to be provided with two or three spare top-pieces, in case of accident from loss or breakage. A trout-rod for trolling with minnow should be from twelve to fourteen, or even sixteen feet in length, of a good firm build, not by any means so elastic as a fly-rod. A rod for worm-fishing ought to be firmly constructed, of the same length as a fly, and pretty stiff in the hand. For what is called " bush -fishing" with the worm, a much shorter rod will answer the purpose; and the stifier it is the better. A pike rod ought to be very strong and stiff, and as straight as an arrow. The length should not be more FISHING-LINES. 87 than fourteen feet; though for our own part we think ten feet long enough. The rings through which the line travels should be strong and large ; and in our opinion the fewer the better. The rod for spinning the minnow is recommended by some experienced anglers to be made of bamboo cane, and to be from eighteen to twenty feet long, with a stiff top. A similar kind of rod, but only about twelve feet in length, is used by some in angling with the ledger bait for the barbel. The rod adapted for roach and dace varies according to the nature of the fishing ground. If the angler has to poke over high banks, or lofty reeds, the rod should not be less than twenty feet and very light ; but if the sport be pursued from a boat, or on water easy of access, a rod of twelve or fourteen feet will be long enough. For the convenience of travelling (either in England or on the continent) what is called " a general rod" is the most eligible. It is so contrived, by means of top joints of various degrees of length and elasticity, to answer the several purposes of fly-fishing, trolling, or bottom-fishing. The whole affair may be so packed up as to be no more trouble than a single rod, or even an ordinary walking-cane. FiSHiNG-LiNES are made of various materials, and of various degrees of strength and length, depending en- tirely upon the kind of angling for which they are required. For salmon and trout-fishing, whatever method we adopt, nothing is so good as a pure horse-hair line. If you have a line for fly-fishing with any portion of silk in 88 HINTS ON ANGLING. it, yuu can never throw a line of any considerable length, with the requisite steadiness and precision. The reason is obvious. When the line has been a short time in the water, the silk gets soaked, becomes soft and flabby, and falls heavily on the water. On the other hand, a good hair line invariably preserves its firmness and elasticity. If the angler be fishing on lakes or large rivers for salmon, he will require from eighty to one-hundred yards of line, but if on a moderate-sized stream, from forty to fifty will be quite sufficient. Some fly-fishers have their lines tapered at the bottom, in order to connect the gut and flies more immediately with it; and indeed this plan is now quite the fashion. But with all due deference to the prevailing mode, we ourselves prefer the old " cast line " of about four or five feet in length, and of from four to six or eight hairs in thickness, on which to place the gut and flies. The line thus prepared can be thrown much truer, and possesses also other advantages over a tapered running line. Lines for trolling, are made of silk, silk and hair, and various other materials. In the process of trolling, the lightness and elasticity of the line are not of so much consequence as in fly-fishing ; but, for our own part we prefer hair lines before any other, even for this sport. The line called a paternoster for perch-fishing, is made of strong gut or gimp, on which are suspended at certain distances, three or more hooks; the whole is connected with the wheel-line, by a small swivel. There are two celebrated localities where the best FLOATS NETS. 89 hooks are manufactured London and Limerick, and the hooks assume the name of these respective places. Good hooks are of essential importance to the angler; and we would earnestly recommend all our countrymen who visit the continent for the purpose of fishing, to provide themselves amply in England with these neces- sary articles, of all sorts and sizes. The French hooks we can assure them are very indifferent indeed. FLOATS are necessary things in certain kinds of angling, and in some particular waters; but they are nevertheless, as all our best brethren will admit, neces- sary evils. For our own part, we never behold a grown- up specimen of humanity angling with a float, without regarding him with a compound feeling of compassion and derision. The float is associated in the mind of the sportsman with the infantile and imbecile part of the craft; and when more lofty and dignified sport has been long enjoyed, it is scarcely possible to bring back the mind to the placid endurance of such appendages. anfc &aff. These sort of things are perhaps absolutely necessary in particular rivers and waters, where, owing to the nature of the banks and sides, it is difficult to land large fish. When made in a portable manner, so as to be car- ried in a fishing-basket or creel, they are occasionally useful adjuncts to an angler's equipment. They are quite unnecessary, however, in streams which have a broad and channelly bed ; and we should never recom- mend them in such situations, for this plain reason, that fish are easily enough brought to shore from 90 HINTS ON ANGLING. water of this description, by any angler of average dexterity. Besides, there is more skill required in cap- turing a fish with the slight tackle of a fly-line, and landing him without any extraneous assistance. All this uncertainty and suspense connected with his sport, is one of the prime elements in the amusement of the angler, and ought never to be materially diminished by any me- chanical contrivances. On t&e Jftetfjofc of mafcing The intelligent reader will bear in mind that all verbal or written instruction on this mechanical process must necessarily be very imperfect. Fly-making is just one of those delicate and minute matters, which can be learned effectively only by imitation. You will learn more in one hour by the eye, than in a twelvemonth by the un- derstanding. The best thing, therefore, a young angler can do, who is ambitious to excel in this department of the craft, is to get some friend who understands making artificial flies to instruct him in the business. Any one may soon acquire the requisite degree of knowledge ; and a little patient practice will speedily render him an adept. But, in conformity with the general practices observed in treatises on fishing, we shall here subjoin a few direc- tions in detail for making artificial flies. We take the account substantially from Captain Kichardson and others ; because anything like originality is quite out of the ques- tion in an operation so purely mechanical. The surest way to complete a number of flies is to have every necessary material arranged immediately under your eye ; every article separate and distinct so as to be grasped in a moment; and all the hooks, gut, or hair. THE MAKING OF FLIES. 91 wings, hackles, dubbing, silk, and wax neatly assorted, and prepared for instant use. The hooks require to be sized for your different flies; the gut demands the most careful examination and adjustment; the hackles must be stripped, and the dubbing well waxed; the silk must be carefully assorted, and of the very finest texture; and the wings must be tied the length of the hook they are to be fastened to, in order that the fibres of the feather may be all brought into the small compass of the hook. This previous care and trouble not only save time in the process, but ensure a degree of neatness in the execu- tion that is otherwise almost unattainable. The tying of the wings is thus performed. A piece of well waxed silk is laid in a noose on the forefinger of the left hand; the wings, or feathers, are put in the under part of the noose, and at the distance of the length of the wing required; the thumb is then applied closely to the feather, and with one end of the noose in the mouth, and the other in the right hand, the noose is drawn quite tight, and the silk is then cut within an inch of the knot, thus leaving a handle by which to hold the wing. If the thumb be not firmly pressed the feathers will be pulled away. FIRST METHOD. How to make a fly with the wings in the natural position in the first instance. Hold the hook by the bend, with the point down- wards, between the forefinger and thumb of the left hand. With your waxed silk in your right hand, give one or two turns round the bare hook, about midway ; lay the end of the gut along the upper side of the hook (if tied on the under side the fly will not swim true, but continually revolve) and wrap the silk firmly until you get within a few turns of the top. Then you must take 92 HINTS ON ANGLING. the wings, lay them along the shank with your right hand, and hold them stiffly in their place to the hook with the left hand. This done, tie the feathers tightly at the point of contact with two or three turns; cut off the superfluous ends of the feather, and, tying the head of the fly very tight, you must carry the silk round the hook, until you come to the knot which fastens the wings. Divide the wings equally, and pass the silk through the division, alternately, two or three times, in order to keep the wings separate and distinct from each other. Now prepare the hackle, by drawing back the fibres; taking care to have two or three less on the but, on that side of the feather which comes next to the hook, in order that it may revolve without twisting away. Tie the but-end of the hackle close to the wings, having its upper or dark side to the head of the fly. The Scotch reverse this, and tie the hackle with its under side to the head, and also strip the fibres entirely from that side which touches the hook. Take the dubbing between the forefinger and the thumb of the right hand, twist it very thinly about your silk, and carry it round the hook as far as you intend the hackle or legs to extend, and hold it between the forefinger and thumb of the left hand, or fasten it at once. Then, with your pliers, carry the hackle round the hook, close under the wings, down to where you have already brought your silk and dubbing; continue to finish your body, by carrying over the end of the hackle ; and when you have made the body of sufficient length, fasten off, by bringing the silk twice or thrice loosely round the hook, passing the end through the coils to make all snug and tight. Some finish the body of this fly thus: when the THE MAKING OF FLIES. 93 hackle is fastened, after it has made the legs of the fly, the bare silk is carried up to the legs, and there fastened. SECOND METHOD. This manner of proceeding differs from the first in the fixing on of the wings. When you have fastened the gut and hook together, to the point where the wings are to be tied, apply the wings to the hook with the but of the feather lying uppermost; then, when the wings are well fastened, pull them back into the natural position alternately; and, having your silk firmly tied to the roots of the wings (and not over the roots), the fly is to be completed as in the first method, having cut off the roots of the feather. THIRD METHOD. This includes the Irish mode of tying flies, and is the plan generally adopted in the tackle shops. There are two ways of finishing a fly by the head. If the wings are to be reversed or turned back, they are to be tied to the hook first, but not immediately turned back ; the silk is carried to the tail of the fly, when the dubbing is carried round the hook until the putting on of the hackle ; the hackle is tied by the point, and not by the but. Having finished the body, twist on the hackle close up to the wings, and fasten by one or two loops; then divide the wings, and pass the silk between them, pulling them back to their proper posi- tion, and finishing the head; fasten off by one or two loops. The Irish tie over the roots of the wings, which inter- feres with their action in the water and renders them lifeless. If the wings are placed at once in their natural posi- tion, and the fly is to be finished at the head, the gut must be tied on the hook, beginning near the head and 94 HINTS ON ANGLING. finishing at the tail; twist on the body up to the legs, fasten on the hackle by the point, finish the body and the legs, and then apply and fasten the wings ; and, when properly divided, cut off the but-ends, finish the head, and fasten off your silk by one or two loops. Thus concludes the method of making the winged fly. ^o mafce t&e Calmer, or f^acftle The making of the PALMER, or HACKLE FLY, with the cock's or hen's feathers, is simply as described in the foregoing methods, namely, by twisting on the legs and body, taking care that the hackle has fibres as long as, or rather longer, than the hook it is to be twisted upon. But in making hackle-flies with the feathers of other birds, such as the snipe, dotterel, &c., the feather is pre- pared by stripping off the superfluous fibres at the but end, and then drawing back a sufficient quantity of fibre to make the fly. Take the feather by the root, and point with both hands, having its outside uppermost, and put the whole of the fibres into your mouth and wet them, so that they may adhere together, back to back. When the gut is fastened to the hook, you must tie on the feather near to the head of the hook, then twist it twice or thrice round the hook, and fasten it by one or more loops; the fibres of the feather will then lie the reverse way. Cut off the superfluous parts of the feather that remain after tying, and twist on the body of the required length; fasten by two loops; draw down the fibres of the feather to the bend; and the fly is finished. If tinsel, or gold or silver twist, be required for the body of the fly, it must be tied on after the hackle, but carried round the body before the hackle makes the legs. If the tinsel be required only at the tail of the fly, it must BAIT FOR SALMON. 95 be tied on immediately after the gut and hook are put together, the hackle next, then the body, etc. BAITS, ETC. THE different kinds of baits used in fishing are extremely numerous, and demand the angler's particular attention, as well with reference to their nature, as to the various modes in which they may be applied. We shall notice these under the head of each fish. for Salmon In treating of bait for this magnificent fish, we shall confine ourselves entirely to the artificial fly. This is the only kind of bait worthy the attention of the genuine angler, or which will secure him unvarying success. We have always considered the employment of any other artifice for luring this noble inhabitant of the streams as directly implying something both frivolous and debasing, alike unworthy of the angler's reputation and the cha- racter of the fish. It must always be borne in mind, that the real angler has a certain kind of fame to support. It is not the mere catching of fish which confers his reputa- tion, but the mode and manner of doing it. And there- fore it is that an angler, having, what the old Scottish covenanter called, " the root of the matter" in him, will on all occasions be remarkably particular and sensitive, as to all the movements and appliances connected with his cherished amusement. There must be nothing low and grovelling nothing which may seem to involve an idea that he is pursuing his fascinating calling under the influence of any motive, but the pure love of his sport. Better lose a thousand fish a day, than adopt or sanction any practices which have even an appearance, 96 HINTS ON ANGLING. however remote, of running counter to the high princi- ples of his profession. The size and colours of the flies to be employed in salmon-fishing must always vary according to the nature of the waters, the state of the wind, the season, and the depth and brilliancy of the stream. There are scarcely any general rules to be laid down, that are not subject to many exceptions. It is the knowledge when general rules are to be followed and when they are to be departed from, that forms such an essential part of an angler's skill, and stamps him as a master of the art. Expe- rience must be our sole guide in this important matter. On angling for salmon in France and Belgium, a con- siderable diversity of opinion prevails amongst sportsmen as to the nature of the flies required, both in regard to size and colour. Some gentlemen of extensive experience and admitted knowledge, uniformly fish with dull-coloured flies; others again, whose claims to respect are equally high, employ extremely gaudy ones. As far as our own observation and practice go, we submit the following list as the most likely to prove successful, when the waters are in good condition; for this is a most essential point. No. 1. Limerick. A red cock hackle, ribbed with gold twist; with drake wings of a tolerable length, and standing well out from each other. No. 2. Body orange mohair ribbed with gold twist; legs a black hackle, and mottled grey feather of the mallard's wing. No. 3. A red cock hackle, ribbed with gold twist, and wings of the woodcock set considerably apart. We have never personally known very large and gaudy flies do much on the continent. The conformation BAIT FOR SALMON. 97 of most of the rivers which contain salmon, is, in our humble opinion, decidedly unfavourable to the employ- ment of big bright flies. Indeed, in many streams, unless they are very much ruffled by heavy winds, the expe- diency of using large brilliant flies may be safely ques- tioned; and for this simple reason: if an angler look steadily and attentively at a large fly when in the water, he will discover that it does not lie evenly on it, so as to preserve the shape of a natural fly ; the hook is too heavy for the superstructure of feathers, and hence the fly rolls about in a very awkward and unnatural manner. This, it will be admitted, defeats the great end and object of fly-fishing deception. The practice, however, in Ireland, is to use very large and gaudy flies; and it is but natural to infer that the general practice arises from a conviction of their utility. O'Shaughnessy, of Limerick, manufactures those which are most used and most esteemed. Mr. Hansard has recently published a work on " Trout and Salmon Fishing in Wales," in which he recommends the following flies for that particular country. FOE THE SPRING. " Wings dark brown mottled feather of the bittern; body orange silk or worsted, with broad gold twist; and a smoky dim hackle for legs." FOR SUMMER. " Wings the brown mottled feather of a turkey-cock's wing, with a few of the green fibres selected from the eye of a peacock's tail-feather; body yellow silk and gold twist, with a deep blood-red hackle for legs." Every fly-fisher who has visited Scotland in pursuit of his favourite amusement, must have observed what an immense variety of flies are commonly used, and with almost equal success, by the numerous anglers who H 98 HINTS ON ANGLING. frequent her streams. We have seen salmon caught in the Tweed, the Esk, and Clyde, with the rudest possible imitations of flies, shining in all the colours of the rainbow. Indeed, we have witnessed this fact so repeatedly, as to found upon it the opinion that salmon are caught in Scotland with much ruder implements, and with far less skill and dexterity than in any other country with which we are acquainted. This may seem fanciful; but never- theless circumstances have fixed upon us the belief. We once saw a shepherd-boy, in Peebles-shire, kill a prime salmon of twelve pounds weight with a common hazel rod, and an ordinary hair line, without a reel or winch of any kind, and with a fly exactly like a humble bee. He hooked the fish in the deep part of a strong stream, and had the sagacity and promptitude to throw his rod immediately into the water after the rushing fish. The force of the current took it down to the calmer end of the stream, where the stripling caught hold of it again, and instantly succeeded in running the salmon into the next stream, and so on, until he had artfully exhausted the fish and forced him into a shallow part of the water; here he got him stranded with admirable dexterity, and eventually captured him in capital style. Instances of this kind are common all over the moun- tainous part of the country, where the greater portion of the native anglers never use either reel or winch, or any analogous contrivance whatever for their common hair lines. Whenever a large fish is hooked, they dash after him, or throw the rod into the water, after the fashion of our shepherd-boy, and endeavour to regain it when the strength and spirit of the fish are comparatively ex- hausted. This mode of salmon-fishing gave rise to the famous BAIT FOR SALMON. 99 story told of Hogg, the Ettrick shepherd, namely, that a large salmon once carried him on its back smack across the Tweed ! The origin of the joke was the following incident. Five-and-twenty years ago, Hogg's residence was the favourite resort of many celebrated literary anglers, both English and Scotch. One day in the month of March, he took out his rod, in the native fashion, without a winch, with a view of trying for a dish of trout, as a sort of savoury prelude to the bottle of Glenlivet and jolly evening with some expected friends. After a few casts he happened, with an ordinary trout-fly, to hook a tre- mendous salmon of forty-two pounds weight ! When he saw what he had got hold of, he threw his rod instantly into the stream, and made no attempt whatever to inter- fere with his magnificent competitor. For three hours the fish swam about with the tackle; but the shepherd becoming impatient, went into the water and got hold of his rod again. By careful manoeuvring and admirable dexterity, he succeeded in bringing his enormous victim within three or four yards of the shore. At this eventful crisis, Hogg ran out of the water, threw his rod on the gravelly side of the stream, and then plunged in again, with the intention of literally tossing his noble prize on the shore. He was successful in giving him a famous throw, but failed to land him. In this emergency, he threw himself flat down upon the fish, and a glorious struggle ensued in the shallow water, the shepherd grasp- ing the salmon in his arms, the fish struggling and splashing at a tremendous rate, and both plunging and rolling about in their furious strife. At this juncture some of his Edinburgh friends came in sight, and seeing him in the water, sorely buffeted by the salmon and 100 HINTS ON ANGLING. nearly exhausted, hurried to the spot. By the united efforts of the party, who were of course delighted with such an adventure, the splendid fish was hauled ashore, to the no small gratification of the inmates of Altrive House, which rang till the " wee short hours" with this deed of piscatory chivalry. Professor Wilson was of the party, and turned the laugh as usual against the shepherd, by seriously maintaining that he had actually been carried on the fish's back from one side of the Tweed to the other. The flies to be used in Scotland in ordinary salmon- fishing may be enumerated as follows, the angler filling up the catalogue according to his fancy or experience. No. 7. Limerick. The body claret and orange mo- hair, or red cock's hackle, with green tip ribbed with gold twist; legs black hackle; wings turkey feather with white tip. No. 5. Body greenish yellow mohair, ribbed with gold twist and red tip; legs black hackle; wings mottled grey. No. 4. Body one half pale red, the other half orange mohair with gold twist; tip turkey's wing; legs red hackle; wings the black and white tail-feather of the turkey. The English rivers are but of little importance in salmon-fishing ; and, on this account we need give no formal enumeration of particular coloured flies for these waters. The best method perhaps is to get flies dressed on such sized hooks, and in such colours as will generally answer at all seasons, for trout, salmon, sea-trout, whiting, etc. As a general principle, it may be safely stated, that a certain degree of gaudiness is indispensable in all salmon- BAIT FOR SALMON. 101 flies ; and the angler will find from experience that light- coloured and showy bodies, and grey-coloured wings, are never-failing instruments of success. This principle, it is true, may be modified in a variety of ways, but it can never be entirely departed from without mortification or disappointment. When the salmon takes the fly, the angler must imme- diately give him line, and particularly bear in mind that the slightest degree of rashness at this crisis will set him at liberty in an instant. No matter how seasoned or how strong your tackle may be, no one can ever succeed in turning a salmon when he is first hooked. It is only by giving him comparatively gentle tugs, or letting him feel the weight and pressure of the line at short intervals, that you can make him rush about backwards and for- wards so as to exhaust his strength. The most unreserved patience is here absolutely indis- pensable. Many fish will require unremitting care and skill for two or three hours before they will yield; and few of any size can be landed as they ought to be in less than an hour. When the river the angler is fishing has a broad shelving bed on each side the stream, between the water and the banks, and there are no trees nor bushes to hamper and perplex his operations, then his work is comparatively easy and expeditious. But, on the contrary, when the river is narrow in its channel, and fills it completely up, and when trees and brushwood abound, it is always a work of difficulty and extreme un- certainty to kill a large salmon with a fly; and if the bottom of the stream be full of roots of trees, large stones and reeds, the case becomes still more desperate and hopeless. When the fish bounds repeatedly out of the water, the 102 HINTS ON ANGLING. chances are that he will succeed in breaking his hold, either by the mere force of his fall into the stream, or by tumbling across the line ; the latter accident scarcely ever fails to set him free. There is a remarkable difference in salmon with reference to their particular movements; some never leap at all, whilst others are at it continually. When the fish takes what is called " the sulks," the chances of killing him are very problematical. A salmon will rise again and again at the fly after he has once missed it. In this respect he difYers widely from the trout. We have seen the salmon miss the fly a dozen times in succession, and at last take it greedily. Should he, however, be slightly hooked in any instance, and break off, he will come no more, at any rate not for some considerable time. It is an essential part of an angler's knowledge to be able to detect with a glance of the eye, the most probable places where salmon may be expected to lie. When fishing in lakes, he must necessarily take the water at hazard ; but in rivers and smaller streams, a considerable latitude is afforded him for a display of judgment and skill. It is not often that the fish are to be found in long straggling streams, comparatively shallow and not lead- ing directly into deep water. They are always very shy about trusting themselves in such places. On the con- trary, a rapid stream leading directly into a sheet of deep, and comparatively still water, is the most probable haunt for fish. Many large fish, however, never go into the streams at all; they keep in deep water amongst large stones, bush-roots, and old sunken roots of trees. When therefore there is a fine curl on the water, and it is other- wise in good condition, the deeps are the places for find- ing fish. The shallow end or tail of a good long deep, BAIT FOR TROUT. 103 where there is a broad bed of gravel or slopes, is, in all salmon rivers, a favourite spot with the fly-fisher. i3aft for Trout-fishing is the very principle of life to the prac- tised and enthusiastic angler. It is that which gives vitality and animation to all his movements, and consti- tutes him what he really is. Without the trout and the salmon he would be, in many respects, a truly pitiable object ; nearly reduced to that degraded state which would fully justify Dr. Johnson's snarling definition of the angler's profession. Bait for trout may be comprehended under three lead- ing classes; flies, trolling with fish, and worms. All other modes we consider fanciful or unfair, and shall therefore leave them unnoticed, and confine our remarks to these three leading departments. In so doing, we shall ground our observations, almost exclusively, on our experience of five-and-thirty years' standing, and a range of waters surpassed by few brethren of the craft. Fly-fishing is the most successful, and, by immeasurable degrees, the most delightful mode of angling for trout. It is graceful and gentlemanly, and can be enjoyed by all who exhibit any anxiety to acquire the art. It is also the most independent mode. You take your rod, fishing- creel, and fly-book, and roam away over half a kingdom, without any further care about bait, or incumbrance from nets or fish-kettles, or other trumpery. In point of exciting the mind, it is infinitely preferable to all other modes of exercising the " gentle art." The constant attention which the angler must pay to his flies as they glide on the water the repeated changes of locality the calm and placid pleasure infused into the soul by 104 HINTS ON ANGLING. sparkling and gushing streams the constant exercise of his skill in casting his line the gentle tantalisings of his hopes by frequent unsuccessful risings at the fly the dexterity and management requisite in killing a fish with such delicate materials and the uncertainty which always hangs over his successful capture, all tend to awaken and keep alive that feeling of the mind on which rests the whole charm of the art. In short, in fly-fishing all the elements are judiciously combined, which contri- bute to render angling an agreeable and healthy amuse- ment. Before we enter into any detail with reference to the application of artificial flies, we beg to make a few pre- liminary observations, which may possibly be of use to the inexperienced fly-fisher. This mode of fishing has given birth to an enormous mass of discussion and conjecture, as to the best kinds of flies for particular countries and waters, so cumbrous and voluminous as to be quite forbidding and confounding to the younger professors of the art. Imagination has been allowed to usurp the place of judgment; and trifling theories, that of comprehensive and well-digested expe- rience. A fly-fisher goes to the water agitated by a thousand fancies, as to what kind and colour of fly the fish are likely to take; and if he be not successful in hooking fish after three or four casts, down he squats and puts on another set of flies. This sort of thing occupies nearly the whole day ; he is constantly shifting his tackle, so that in the evening his creel is as empty as it was in the morning. Now, we have long arrived at the conclusion, that anglers are vastly more fastidious about the shape and colour of their flies than trout are. The fact seems to be, that BAIT FOR TROUT. 105 when trout are inclined to feed on this kind of bait, it does not much signify what shape or colour your fly is, provided the SIZE be strictly attended to. Any great disproportion in this particular will decidedly mar all chance of success. When a stream has been completely covered with what is called the " may-fly," and the fish rising at them in all directions, we have filled our creel in quick time with other kinds of flies, as opposite as pos- sible, both in shape and colour, to that particular insect. Now it is a commonly received notion amongst many expert anglers, that when trout are rising at these flies they will scarcely look at anything else. Nothing can be more erroneous, as experience will amply testify if proper means be employed. True it is, we have occasionally met with a few instances, where trout dashing rapidly at the natural fly, have obstinately refused the artificial fly; but in all such cases as have come under our observ- ation, we have, upon inspection, invariably found the rejected fly too large in size. On the substitution of a small one, somewhat in conformity perhaps as to shape, though it may be decidedly opposite in colour to the insect on which the fish were feeding, the evil has been immediately rectified, and trout taken with great rapidity. But what we consider almost decisive of this question is this; when we traverse a fine trout-stream, we often meet in the course of our rambles ten or a dozen brother anglers, all well skilled in the craft, and employing an endless variety of fly. If the fish be in good humour, the whole fraternity bear testimony ; the difference in the num- ber of fish each one has got will be but very trifling, and will well enough be considered referable to the difference of time they may respectively have been on the rivers, or the casual advantages which some might enjoy over 106 HINTS ON ANGLING. others by falling in with better streams. Mutual congra- tulations and compliments are here the order of the day, and the superior excellence of particular flies eagerly com- mented on. But, on the other hand, when the fish have no inclination for the fly, we find the reverse of all this. Every one shakes his head in despair, and swears he has tempted them in vain with every conceivable object in his fly-book. Now all this, which is an every day occur- rence, is inexplicable, except upon our theory, that when the fish are inclined to feed they are not nice to a shade of colour ; and when they are not, the best ingenuity of man may be displayed to no purpose. We fished for five or six successive seasons some of the finest and most prolific rivers in England and Scotland, in company with one of the very best fly-fishers in Great Britain, the author of most of the papers in " Black wood's Magazine" on this art; and we invariably used different coloured flies. It was quite astonishing to see how nearly, on finishing in the evening, we were to each other in point both of number and quality of fish. If one had a bad day so had the other; and if good both participated in the success. In the north of England, and in Scotland, there are angling matches very frequently, between two first-rate fly-fishers, to decide who shall kill the greater number of fish on a given day, both traversing the same tract of water, taking the streams alternately, just as they come to hand, and beginning and finishing at certain points. These exploits generally attract a good deal of attention for a considerable distance round the country. We have ourselves witnessed four of such contests; and on these occasions the difference between the rivals never exceeded eight or ten fish, out of a day's sport yielding from eight BAIT FOR TROUT. 107 to ten dozen each ; and in only two cases had the contend- ing parties a single fly alike ! In addition to these statements, we must be allowed to add, that we fished one entire season for trout with only two kinds of flies the red and black palmer; and we were as successful on the whole period as any of our angling competitors. Now these statements and facts are introduced, not with a view of enforcing, in a dogmatical spirit, any general rules for the government of fly-fishers, but solely to guard young beginners from falling into a fidgetty and fastidious habit of perpetually changing flies, whenever their success is not commensurate with their hopes. We never knew a fancy angler with an old bit of gut. The fact is, there are general rules in this art as well as in every other; but they must be deduced from carefully collated facts. One grain of reasoning founded on expe- rience is worth a ton of theory and speculation in such cases. There is a fertile source of deception as to the trout's fondness for particular flies which deserves our notice; it is this: having cast our line over a stream, when we draw it across, the bob-fly is the first which by the me- chanical process can solicit the attention of the fish. When, therefore, trout are in the humour, this will, in the majority of cases, appear to be the favourite fly, and the angler notes down on the " tablet of his memory" that such is really the case. We have often changed the flies on this account, with a view to testing the fact. That which seemed to be the favourite fly was put on the stretcher, and an entirely different fly mounted as the bob, and yet the result was just the same; the latter became apparently the favourite fly, and the stretcher was comparatively neglected. 108 HINTS ON ANGLING. This we feel confident arises solely from the mechanical arrangement of the flies, and the manner in which the line is thrown. The bob comes over the nose of the fish first, and he takes it immediately, never calculating on what may be behind him. We would therefore advise all young anglers to pay strict attention to this matter, before they adopt any hasty conclusion as to the pre- ference which the fish may seem to give to any particular fly- In conformity with the inference fairly deducible from these general observations, we shall not furnish the reader with any elaborate or pompous list of flies; but confine ourselves to such standard and every-day articles of sport, as will not, we hope, disappoint the angler, pro- vided he is content to put up with a solid though appa- rently homely bill of fare. jpltcs for Jprance anU The RED HACKLE and RED PALMER flies, on No. 6, Limerick, will prove killing bait in these countries, in the early part of the season. As summer advances, the same flies on hooks two sizes less will answer the angler's pur- pose well; if ribbed with gold tinsel, they will be still better in the months of May and June. The DOTTEREL HACKLE is a sure fly; the body made of yellow silk, and the legs and wings of the feather of the dotterel. The sizes of the hooks may vary from 6 to 10, according to the condition and clearness of the water. A black cock's hackle body, with wings from the woodcock's wing, on Nos. 6 to 8, will be best for April and May. A red cock's hackle body, with wings of the grey drake, on Nos. 4 to 10: this is a standard fly, both for FLIES FOR GREAT BRITAIN, ETC. 109 salmon and trout, nearly all the year round, both on the continent and in Great Britain. A body made of copper-coloured peacock's herl ; legs a black cock's hackle; and wings either of the water- hen's wing, or from the woodcock's breast. This fly, if slightly ribbed with gold tinsel, will answer admirably in June and July after a flood. It may be wrapped on hooks from Nos. 6 to 10 according to circumstances. Jplfes for (Sreat ^Britain anfc The flies above-mentioned, as favourable for the waters of France and Belgium, will be found equally killing in Great Britain and Ireland; but in addition to this small but efficient list, we shall add the following more copious catalogue of what we consider the best flies for all waters and all seasons; and, we doubt not, the angler who is not over fastidious, will find it sufficiently ample for all effec- tive purposes. THE CHANTRY FLY. Body copper-coloured pea- cock's herl, ribbed with gold twist; legs black hackle; wings partridge's brown herl feathers or pheasant's tail. Hook, Nos. 9 or 10. MARCH BROWN. Body fur of the hare's ear, ribbed with olive silk; legs partridge hackle; wings tail- feather of the partridge; tail two or three fibres of the partridge feather. Hook, Nos. 8 or 9. THE BLUE DUN FLY. Body dubbed with water- rat's fur, and ribbed with yellow silk; legs a dun hen's hackle ; wings the feather of the starling's wing; tail two fibres of a grizzled cock's hackle. Hook, No. 10. 110 HINTS ON ANGLING. THE CAKSHALTON COCK-TAIL FLY. Body light blue fur; legs dark dun hackle; wings the inside feather of a teal's wing; tail two fibres of a white cock's hackle. Hook, No. 9 or 10. THE PALE YELLOW DUN FLY. Body yellow mo- hair, or martin's pale yellow fur, tied with yellow silk; wings the lightest part of a feather from a young star- ling's wing. Hook, No. 12. THE ORANGE DUN FLY. Body red squirrel's fur, ribbed with gold thread; legs red hackle; wings from the starling's wing; tail two fibres of red cock's hackle. Hook, No. 9. THE GREAT RED SPINNER. Body hog's wool, red and brown mixed, ribbed with gold twist; legs bright red cock's hackle; wings the light feather of the star- ling's wing; tail three fibres of a red cock's hackle. Hook, No. 7. THE BLACK GNAT FLY. Body black hackle, or ostrich's herl, tied with black silk; wings the feather from a starling's wing. Hook, No. 13. THE BRACHEN BLACK FLY. Body peacock's herl, dressed full, and tied with purple silk; wings feather from a pheasant's breast. Hook, No. 9 or 10. THE RED ANT FLY. Body peacock's herl, made full at the tail, and spare towards the head, red or ginger cock's hackle; wings the light feather of the starling's wing. Hook, No. 9 or 10. FLIES FOR GREAT BRITAIN, ETC. Ill THE LAND FLY. Body the fur from a hare's neck, twisted round with silk of the same colour; legs a ginger hen's hackle; wings the feather from a land- rail's wing. Hook, No. 9. THE ALDER FLY. Body peacock's herl, tied with dark brown silk; legs cock-a-budder hackle; wings the brown speckled feather of a mallard's back. Hook, No. 8. THE GREEN DRAKE FLY. Body yellow floss silk, ribbed with brown silk; the extreme head and tail cop- pery peacock's herl; legs a red or ginger hackle ; wings the mottled wing of a mallard stained olive; tail three hairs of a rabbit's whiskers. Hook, No. 6. THE GREY DRAKE. Body white floss silk, ribbed with dark brown or mulberry coloured silk; head and tip of the tail, peacock's herl; legs a grizzled cock's hackle; wings a mallard's mottled feather made to stand upright; tail three whiskers of a rabbit. Hook, No. 6 or 7. THE GOVERNOR FLY. Body coppery-coloured pea- cock's herl, ribbed with gold twist; legs red or ginger hackle ; wings the light part of a pheasant's wing. Hook, No. 9. THE COACHMAN FLY. Body copper-coloured pea- cock's herl; legs red hackle; wings the light feathers of the land-rail. Hook, No. 8. THE COW-DUNG FLY. Body dull lemon-coloured 112 HINTS ON ANGLING. mohair; legs red hackle; wings a feather of the land- rail or starling's wing. Hook, Nos. 8 or 9. Having now mentioned the principal matters relative to the artificial fly, we must venture a few remarks, for the benefit of our younger brethren of the craft, on the proper mode of using it. The two leading points connected with this depart- ment are the casting of the flies, and the acquirement of that peculiar knowledge which enables the skilful angler to recognise at a glance those parts of the stream where trout are likely to lie during the fly-fishing season. The first maxim a beginner should attend to, is, not to have his line too long. He should not attempt too much at first. To acquire the steady and efficient command of his rod is a great matter. The cast line, with gut and flies, ought to be just the length of the rod and no longer; and the early efforts of the beginner should be confined to the employment of a very few yards more in making his casts ; as he progresses in adroitness and skill, he can of course lengthen his line accordingly. There is great comfort and convenience connected with the use of a single-handed rod. In small rivers, particularly if the banks are lined with brush-wood, and the water is reedy, and the bottom full of roots of trees, etc., the angler should learn the habit of what may be called " chucking" his fly into those parts of the stream which run under bushes, and form strong ripples and currents beneath overhanging boughs. In such situations the trout are generally numerous, and of the first size and quality. We have seen many good two-handed fly- fishers, who lost ranges of the finest water, on account of FLY- FISHING FOR TKOUT. 113 not being able to fish narrow and woody streams. In rivers which run through a bed scooped out by moun- tain-torrents, two or three times as broad as the quantity of water which they ordinarily supply, the fly-fisher has plenty of elbow-room, and can use a long rod and line, which require both hands, with very good effect; but in smaller streams, such as those just described, there is no- thing like a light single-handed rod, it gives you great power over the water, and enables you, as it were, to pick fish out of places that the double-handed artist must in- variably pass by. To measure distances accurately with the eye is an essential part of a fly-fisher's profession. This can only be acquired by close attention and constant practice. No written or verbal rules of direction can possibly teach it; and yet every one may attain a high degree of excellence in this respect, if he devote himself patiently to the sub- ject; and one or two seasons' free range with the fly will enable him to hit his point nearly to a hair's breadth in every cast of his line. In the progress of the art of angling, many crotchety and fanciful rules have been laid down with sufficient dogmatism. Amongst these, that Avhich recommends fishing up a stream instead of down it, still retains its ad- vocates and defenders. We do not hesitate to say, nothing can be more preposterous than this notion. If the angler will observe attentively the manner in which flies lie on the water, when the line is thrown up against the cur- rent, he will see in an instant the almost impossibility of the trout seizing the fly in such a position. But even if he should take it, the power is lost to retain him ; for the tightness and tenacity of the line are destroyed by the fish rushing down stream, right into your face as it were. i 114 HINTS ON ANGLING. The best, and indeed only efficient, mode is to fish down the river; and, where it is possible, fish each stream in it right across. To do this, begin at that part of the stream which is nearest to you, and trail your line at a considerable angle to the other, or vice versa, as the case may be. If the fish rise when your tackle is in this posi- tion, there is far greater probability of his hooking him- self than if any other direction be taken; and, when hooked, his rushes down stream bring him in direct op- position to the strain of the line and the spring of the rod, and so expedite his capture. If it should happen, as it often does, that you have a strong head-wind against you in descending a river, then you must make the best of your situation, and contrive to throw your line at as slight an angle in an upward direction as the breeze will let you. Steady practice and perseverance, however, will enable you to overcome all difficulty arising from this source, unless you encounter a hurricane. To have, what may be called, an angler s eye, is of great importance in fly-fishing, and indeed, in fishing of all kinds. This consists, in perceiving at a glance, where the fish may be presumed to be, in any stream or water. This apparently intuitive knowledge, is solely the result of observation and experience, and not any written directions can convey it to the young beginner. Still, without it, no man can make any satisfactory progress in the art. An expert angler, if he sees a brother of the craft flogging away in certain parts of the water, detects in a moment that he can have no correct notions on the subject, and is, in this matter, a veritable ignoramus. The trout observes the same rule as the salmon, with respect to his haunts and places of abode. The latter never ventures into very shallow water, at a great distance TROLLING FOR TROUT. 115 from a deep place of shelter; and thus long shallow streams situated a considerable distance from a range of deep water, are seldom frequented by large trout, except at night in the summer, when they run a considerable dis- tance up such water, in pursuit of minnows. Those streams therefore are the best, which lead immediately into tolerably deep water. It is a good general rule in fly-fishing, never to remain very long at one particular spot. When you have the water before you, take the best streams, and fish them carefully but as quickly as you can. Remember, a trout never can be ENTICED. All his movements are impulsive and prompt ; and if you cast your fly where he lies, he will generally dash at it at once ; but should he miss it in his eagerness, do not tempt him again for a few minutes; rather recede a little to allow him time to regain his former position, and then, you will stand a fair chance of getting hold of him at the next attack. Many an excel- lent trout has been caught in this manner, which would have been lost altogether, if the angler had persisted in thrashing away at him after his first unsuccessful rise. Drolling for This mode of fishing for trout is much practised in Eng- land as well as on the continent; and it is a very successful one, particularly in the spring of the year. Trolling, how- ever, lies under a species of reproach, as being of a poking, poaching, interloping character ; and on this account, it is strictly prohibited in some fishing districts in England. In some parts of France it is freely practised ; but as the law most decidedly forbids it, it can only be exercised where the authorities and proprietors are content to wink at it. 116 HINTS ON ANGLING. A trolling rod, as we have already mentioned should be pretty long and stiff, with a line a shade stronger than that used for the artificial fly. The best minnows for the purpose are those of a moderate size, their sides aiid bellies being of a pearly whiteness. If the angler has con- veniences, they are all the better for being kept a few days in clear sweet soft water; this process renders them firmer and brighter. There are numerous modes of baiting with the minnow ; but they all resemble each other so nearly, that a minute description of each is quite unnecessary. Some trollers employ six or seven hooks; and others only two or three. This is, in a great measure, a matter of taste and fancy. As a general rule, however, it may safely be determined, that, in those rivers, particularly in France, which run deep with a swift current, have a muddy weedy bad bot- tom, and whose sides are covered with brush- wood, that tackle is the best which is the strongest and mounts the greatest number of hooks. It is only by jerking and holding the fish tight by the head, that it is possible to catch it ; for if you allow him to run in such situations, he will soon smash your tackle all to shivers. But in fine clear streams with gravelly or pebbly bottoms, fewer hooks will answer better ; inasmuch as deception is more effectually preserved. We shall make no apology for inserting two quotations on the art of trolling for trout; the one from good " old Izaak Walton," the other from "Stephen Oliver, the younger," who seems to have paid great attention to this branch of the art. Their united experience would seem to have exhausted the subject. Walton says; " And then you are to know, that your minnow must be so put on your hook, that it must turn TROLLING FOR TROUT. 117 round when it is drawn against the stream; and, that it may turn nimbly, you must put it on a big-sized hook, as I shall now direct you, which is thus : put your hook in at his mouth, and out at his gill, then having drawn your hook two or three inches beyond or through his gill put it again into his mouth, and the point and beard out at his tail ; and then tie the hook and his tail aboul , very neatly with a white thread, which will make it the apte) to turn quick in the water; that done, pull back that part of your line which was slack when you did put your hook into the minnow the second time. I say, pull that part of your line back, so that it shall fasten the head, so that the body of the minnow shall be almost straight on your hook; this done, try how it will turn, by drawing it across the water, or against the stream ; and if it do not turn nimbly, then turn the tail a little to the right or left hand, and try again till it turn quick, for, if not, you are in danger to catch nothing; for know, that it is impossible that it should turn too quick." Thus far from " old Izaak Walton." Stephen Oliver remarks, " I have a gilse hook (No. 3 or 4) at the end of the line, but wrapped on the end of the shank, to make it secure, and to leave more room to bait : an inch, or very little more, from the shank end of the gilse hook, I wrap on a strong hook, about half the size of the other. I put the point of the large hook in at the mouth of the minnow, and out at the tail, on the right side of the minnow, bending it half round as I put it in ; then I put the other hook in, below the under chap, which keeps the minnow's mouth quite close. " When I am in no hurry, I tie the hook and tail toge- ther with a very small white thread : before I enter the little hook, I draw up the minnow to its full length, and make 118 HINTS ON ANGLING. it fit the bending of the great hook, to make it twirl round when it is drawn in the water. When all is in order, I take the line in my left hand, a little above the bait, and throw it under-hand, lifting up my right and the rod, that the bait may fall gently on the water. I stand at the very top of the stream, as far off as my tackle will permit, and let the bait drop in a yard from the middle of it : I draw the minnow by gentle pulls, of about a yard at a time across the stream, turning my rod up the water, within half a yard of its surface, keeping my eye fixed on the minnow. " When a fish takes it, he generally hooks himself: however, I give a smart strike, and if he does not get off then, I am pretty sure of him. In this manner I throw in three or four lines, at the upper part of a stream, but never twice in the same place, but a yard lower every cast. I always throw quite over the stream, but let the bait cross it in a round, like a semicircle, about a foot below the surface, which the two shot of No. 3 or 4, which I always have upon my line, nine or ten inches from the hooks, will sink it to. When I am draw- ing the bait across the stream, I keep the top of the rod within less than a yard from the water, and draw it down- wards, that the bait may be the greater distance from me; and the first thing that the fish will see. Sometimes I can see the fish before he takes the bait ; and then I give in the rod a little, that the minnow may as it were meet him half way ; but, if I think he is shy, I pull it away, and do not throw it in again till he has got to his feeding place. " The twisting of the minnow is the beauty of this kind of angling, the fish seeing it at a great distance, and fancying it is making all the haste it can to WOKM-FIjSHING FOK TROUT. 119 escape from them ; and they make the same haste to catch it." OTorm- JfisJNng for Worm-fishing for trout may be divided into two kinds : one, the angling in streams, both when they are full and flooded, and in clear weather when they are purer ; the other, shade-fishing, which is practised in the hottest and brightest weather, when the rivers are nearly dried up, and fishing can be got by scarcely any other means. Some anglers are very expert at this kind of sport, and often kill considerable quantities of fish. The great se- cret is, to know where the fish lie, to keep the line per- fectly perpendicular, and when the water is clear and bright, to have the lightest and finest tackle consistent with the requisite strength. The red worm which has been sufficiently scoured in moss, is the very best that can be used. Some indeed prefer the brandling, but it never stands the water so well as the red worm. There is a good worm to be found under old cow-dung in the fields, but these are not always to be got when wanted. The worm ought not to be large ; for in bright days, when the streams are clear and sparkling, the trout will scarcely even look at a big worm. The hooks for worm-fishing should always be straight. Those with a bend generally break the worm speedily, and in clear water this is fatal to success. The hooks ought also to be as small as is compatible with the easy threading of the worm. In a suitable stream, shade or bush-fishing is one of the most agreeable and amusing modes of angling. It is the only method which gives you an insight into the 120 HIM- .NG. instinct and habits of the trout. In the months of July and August, when the weather is dry and hot, and the sun shines fiercely over head, and the streams are nearly dried up, and ordinary anglers smile in derision, that any one should be fool enough to take a rod in hand; go out with some small red worms, to a shady part of the stream where there is a fine stony or gravelly bottom, and as great a depth of water as you can find. Here worm your way into the very thickest part of the bushes, taking care to have the sun full in your face ; for, if you get with your back to the sun, the shadow of yourself and rod falling on the water will entirely defeat your object. Your rod must be short and stiff, and the rings rather large; in order that when you hook a fish, there should be no obstacle in the way to your giving him whatever length of line his size may require. When you have taken up the desired position ; peep cautiously into the deep water and you will soon perceive fish. Bait your hook, and let it drop into the water, without any shot, as snugly and lightly as possible; you will soon see how greedily the bait will be seized. Though deep water is of course preferable, still, if the water be only six inches in depth, it will answer your purpose. In such situations, if you perceive trout, you will observe that almost every fish has a certain spa< water to himself, about which he takes his regular rounds always returning to the spot from whence he set out. Watch when he starts from his position, and then throw your bait behind him, in the spot he has just left, so that when he returns, it may be lying still at the bottom. He will seize it for a moment, hold it in doubt as if startled, and when he fancies all in safe, he will gobble up the worm, WOUM-F1S11ING FOll TROUT. 121 shake his head when he finds something is appended to it, and then plunge off with all speed. The bush-angler should carefully contrive to keep the end of his rod exactly parallel with the edge of the water, for if he allow it to hang over the bank or bushes, the fish will see it, take fright, and walk off without ceremony. Jn drawing the line out of the water, care should be taken to avoid lifting it up perpendicularly ; it should rather be drawn out in a slanting direction, and then the water will not be so much disturbed. When the weather and water are best adapted for shade or bush-fishing, the trout is often very hungry ; and if you can only contrive to keep yourself and tackle well out of sight, you may safely calculate on good success. In order to show to what extremities this fish is sometimes reduced, we shall relate an incident, which fell under our own observation in the year 1826. This was a remark- ably hot dry summer; many rivers were nearly dried up; and the fish in some of the shallower streams were entirely destroyed for want of water. We had gone out one fiercely hot day, to the distance of ten miles, in the North of England, to a favourite spot for bush-fishing. When we arrived at the water, we found, to our dismay, that we had left our worm bag behind us. Our mortification was ex- treme. To get a worm of any kind was next to impossible ; for there had not been a drop of rain for three entire months, and the fields were burnt up like the deserts of Africa. We happened, by mere chance, to have an old bait-bag in our pocket, in which there were about twenty old dried up shrivelled worms, so dry indeed that they almost crumbled into powder between the finger and thumb. We steeped them in water as a desperate resource, and contrived to thread them on a very small hook. The 122 HINTS ON ANGLING. expedient proved successful; and we returned home with a very full basket of trout. We beg to remark, that we have never used the pre- pared salmon-roe for trout, excepting twice, in our whole life. We have always thought it beneath the character of a genuine sportsman to employ it ; and on this account, we refrain from giving any directions, either for making or using it. We have occasionally, indeed, witnessed its deadly and destructive effects; but these very effects acted upon us as the strongest repellents against its use. We once saw two country fellows on the river Tweed, about five miles above the town of Howick in Roxburgh- shire, kill as many trout with this preparation, in a few hours as filled a good-sized sack ; and we then made a rule never to use it. Indeed, it is not angling, in any honest and proper sense of the word. The French anglers catch hundreds of trout in the months of May and June with the natural May-fly. They put him alive on a small hook, and let him float down the stream, and are generally very successful. They throw or spin their fly into particular spots with consider- able dexterity; but this fly-fishing closes when the May- fly is gone. Many of the English on the continent imi- tate this practice; but it is a beggarly unsportsmanlike affair, and ought to be cashiered altogether. 8 for fifce. There are various methods of catching the pike. He may be snared, trimmered, angled for with the float, huxed, trolled, snapped, shot, and unfortunately, in the open rivers of England, he is remorselessly and ille- gally netted. The trick of SNAKING used to be and we suppose is SNARING AND TRIMMERING PIKE. 123 no\v done to perfection in the small streams which drop into the Ouse in Huntingdonshire, and in the large ditches and drains in the fens, about Ely, Soham, Whittlesea, etc. etc. A strong, short, stiff, ashen bough, or rough rod about ten or twelve feet in length is generally used for this purpose. From the thinner end of it is suspended a thread of copper wire, about three feet in length with a running noose, kept wide open. This wire must be previ- ously burnt in hay ; which renders it ductile and pliable as a thin piece of lead, and takes off all the shine. When the pike is discovered basking in the water, the noose is cautiously slipped over the head of the fish an operation requiring considerable dexterity, owing to the refraction of the water, and, as soon as it clears the gills, a sharp jerk fixes the snickle, and the fish is dragged out of the water by main force, the wire cutting deep into his flesh when the pike is large. Hundreds are taken in this manner in calm sunny days, when the fish are basking in still water, and can be easily seen. The TRIMMER is a fatal weapon, more destructive than any other, but utterly unworthy of a sportsman. It re- quires no skill, no patience, and very little attention ; well adapted to poachers, and very convenient to gamekeepers. A double hook, with a twisted wire shank about five inches long, having a loop at the end, must be baited with a bright shining roach, or gudgeon, alive or dead, it does not much signify which. The wire must be put down its throat, and drawn through at the vent, the hooks being neatly placed 011 either side the mouth, with the points downwards. This wire must be attached to a strongish line of common twine about sixteen or twenty yards in length. About three or four feet above the 124 HINTS ON ANGLING. bait, the line should pass through the centre of an ordi- nary sized bung, a small moveable peg being thrust in with it to keep it fast; this peg should be fastened to the bung with a thin thread of twine, which should pass round the rim of the bung to keep it from splitting. Eight or ten inches further from the bait, a very small cork tied to the line will prevent it from twisting. These floats are often painted of different colours, which give them a showy appearance in the water. The line thus prepared must be fastened at the other end to a strong peg, six or eight inches long, which must be driven into the ground, on which, when the trimmer is taken up, the line can be wrapped. When the bait is thrown into the water, a few yards of the line should be coiled neatly against the peg, in order to allow the fish to run off with a little more line if necessary. The trimmer is better without shot or weight of any kind. Another kind of trimmer, called the " floating trim- mer," is also a very killing affair, and is thus constructed. A small roll of wood, seven or eight inches long, has a shallow groove cut round the middle, and a small slit about half an inch deep, sawn across one of the ends. To the groove in the centre, a line about fifteen or six- teen yards in length is firmly tied ; and when baited, as before described, is wound round the roll of wood, with the exception of three or four feet, or more, above the bait; it is then drawn through the slit, but not too tightly, so that when a fish seizes the bait he may in- stantly release it, and run it off the roll without the slightest resistance. Some make these trimmers in a fanciful style, using large round bungs painted different colours on the different sides, with the line so fixed that when the pike takes the bait, the trimmer may roll over, HUXING PIKE. 125 and betray the run by the altered colour. This is said to be occasionally amusing : for our own part, we consider it a very contemptible affair altogether. The pike is angled for with a large float and a live bait, the hook being thrust under the back fin, or through the nose, of a strong gudgeon or roach. A strong gimp hook must be used ; a small bullet to keep the bait down ; a stiff rod, and a pretty strong line. The bait should swim, about mid- water if shallow, and not more than three or four feet under any circumstances. In weedy waters this mode of fishing is worse than useless. The float will not allow the line to run freely through the weeds when the fish bolts off to gorge, and the chances are, that, in nine cases out of ten, you will not only lose your fish, but injure him also, and damage your tackle as well. Even at the best, and under the most favourable circumstances, it is but a bungling piece of business, fit only for schoolboys and cockneys. HuxiNG is done by fastening a live bait to a large dis- tended ox-bladder, and throwing them into the water as a sort of floating trimmer. When the pike has swallowed the bait, it is capital fun for a schoolboy to watch the bladder bobbing up in spite of the exertions of the very largest fish to koutf) BRECKNOCKSHIRE. The Wye and the Uske. CARDIGANSHIRE. The Tyvy, Rydel, Dovey, and Wyra. CAERMARTHENSHIRE. The Towy, Tyvey, and Taff. GLAMORGANSHIRE. The Elwy, Tawy, Rumney, Taff, and Neath. PEMBROKSHIRE. The Twyvy and the Cleddy. RADNORSHIRE. The Wye and the Teme. SCOTLAND. And here awhile the Muse, Iligh-hovering o'er the broad cerulean scene, Sees CALEDONIA in romantic view; Her airy mountains, from the waving main Invested with a keen diffusive sky, Breathing the soul acute ; her forests huge, Incult, robust, and tall, by Nature's hand Planted of old ; her azure lakes between, Pour'd out extensive, and of wat'ry wealth Full ; winding deep and green, her fertile vales ; With many a cool, translucent, brimming flood Wash'd lovely, from the Tweed (pure parent stream) To where the north-inflated tempest foams O'er Orca's or Betubium's highest peak. Thompson. THERE is perhaps no country in Europe, taking all things into the account, its comparatively limited extent, number and length of streams, size of lakes, etc., etc., so favourable for the purposes of the angler, as Scotland. Every little river, burn, torrent, or creek, however 312 HINTS ON ANGLING. narrow its bed or limited its range, is full of line trout; whilst at the same time, the whole country abounds with immense quantities of the varieties of the noble salmon; the fish above all others, best qualified to afford the angler the most heart-stirring and refined amusement to which his art can aspire. Scotland, being but a small country, bounded on all sides, but one, by the ocean; and being, moreover, very hilly and mountainous, all the waters which flow from its bosom, have an easy, short, and rapid descent to the sea ; and these circumstances are favourable to the prolific powers of the trout and salmon, and are the cause of those remarkable facilities which the rod-fisher enjoys in every portion of the " land-o'-cakes." There are here no long tracks of flat country, through which drowsy rivers meander with a sluggish motion, and thus become com- paratively unfit for the higher and more skilful species of angling; but every thing is rushing, rapid, clear, and sparkling; from the banks of the Tweed to John-o- Groat's house. In every direction, and in beautiful variety, you fall in with the fine majestic river, the limpid bubbling stream, the mountain torrent, and the silvery rivulet, with their countless millions of salmon and trout, which revel in unbounded freedom in their delicious waters, without a rival, and unconscious of any enemy, save the tyrant, man. But, rich as Scotland is in piscatory resources and facilities, this is not her only claim upon the attention of the angler. There is a remarkable degree of ease and pleasure in angling in this country, arising from another source. Scotland affords, in the first place, a comparatively open and free field for the pursuit of this delightful and rational amusement. Impediments arising from SCOTLAND. 313 exclusive preserves, and pet waters, are of very rare oc- currence indeed; and the fair and gentlemanly sportsman, will experience but little interruption from obstructions of this description. Indeed, it may almost be said, that nuisances of this nature are entirely unknown in Scotland. On this account all the movements of the wanderer are free and unfettered. The sport is so universally indulged in, that there is not a town or village in the whole country, situated near a river or stream of any kind, in which you will not meet with anglers of first-rate pretensions; men too, who are far above any mean feeling of petty jealousy, at your intrusion into their accustomed haunts, or your participation in their favourite amusement. In fact, despicable and unworthy feelings or sentiments of this kind, can never be encouraged, or even generated in a country, where every mere boy can go out and fill his creel with the finest trout in a few hours, and perhaps bring home half a dozen prime and delicious salmon into the bargain. But free and unrestrained as the angler's personal movements are in this country ; they are not more so than the movement of his tackle. Here there are scarcely any impediments to the full and free use of the fly, arising from trees, or bushes, or underwood of any kind. The country is remarkably open ; and the rushing and impetuous waters of the fresh streams, scoop out for themselves such broad and capacious beds, that ample room is afforded for the full swing of the very longest line, which a man can use with a rod. You may wander down the banks of a river for twenty or thirty miles, and never stumble on a single tree or bush. This is especially the case with the river Tweed; for from its source to the town of Peebles, there is scarcely a solitary twig to be seen on its banks. 314 HINTS ON ANGLING. Another great advantage which the angler enjoys in Scotland, arises from the fact, that he need not be so fastidious about his flies as he would require to be, or rather as he would be induced to be, in other countries, by the mere force of custom and prejudice. If you have any stock of tolerably well-made flies, and the waters are in good order, you may as surely calculate upon good sport, as upon the appearance of to-morrow's sun. In a word, disappointment can never be permanently, or even generally, experienced in this splendid fishing country. We have presented our readers with a list of the rivers of Scotland; and where all the waters are so good, it is almost unnecessary to declare a preference for any; but for the sake of our countrymen in the south of England, who may be induced to pay a visit to Caledonia's streams, we shall point out two or three localities, which will not fail to afford them as full a share of sport as they can have any reasonable right to expect. There can be no disappointment or want of success here, provided that ordinary skill and ordinary industry are faithfully com- bined. The Tweed is, beyond all question, the finest river in Scotland for either trout or salmon ; nay, we may almost venture to add, that take it as a whole, there is no river like it in all Europe. The angler can fish it with the fly perfectly unmolested, from its source to its mouth. During the first thirty miles of its course, not a bush nor a tree is to be seen; nothing but the limpid stream winding its murmuring way among hills of considerable elevation, in many cases rounded as in a lathe, and covered with the loveliest verdure to their very summits. To an eye long familiarised with the soft and rich, but comparatively tame scenery of merry England, a ramble SCOTLAND. 315 along the banks of the Tweed in this part of its course will afford a novel and truly delightful treat. Fine rippling rushing streams, as clear and transparent as the purest crystal, will attract the enraptured angler every fifty or sixty yards on his route ; whilst the broad channelled bed of the river, free from bush or twig, or impediments of any kind, will afford him every possible facility for casting his line, or landing his fish. If there be a single breath of air wandering about these hills, it soon frisks upon the surface of the glassy waters ; so that even in the brightest weather the industrious angler can scarcely be disappointed of his sport. The supplv of fish seems to be nearly inexhaustible, for from sixteen to twenty dozen trout, with a goodly sprinkling of salmon, are no uncommon result of a single days' work by an expert and persevering sportsman. Another great advantage which the Tweed possesses, as a fishing river, arises from the circumstance, that all her tributary streams will afford the angler an almost endless succession of splendid sport. They are all sup- plied in rich abundance with trout and salmon; and as they flow from many opposite directions, they afford to the inhabitants of widely separated sections of the king- dom, the opportunity of enjoying the most delightful amusement in all parts of their waters. But good as their tributary streams unquestionably are, and lavishly sup- plied with fish, as experience will prove them to be; they are still not to be compared with the parent water. The angler will be compelled to acknowledge that the Tweed stands unrivalled, and that there are few streams we may almost say, none which can compete with this delightful fishing river. The principal tributaries of the Tweed, in which we 316 HINTS ON ANGLING. have ourselves angled, are the Whitadder, the Blackadder, the Jed, and the Teviot, all three abound with fish, and we can safely say, few foreign streams have afforded us such delicious sport. After the waters of the Tweed and its various tribu- taries, we have found the best localities in Scotland, on the banks of the rivers, in Forfarshire, Argyleshire, and Dumfrieshire. Indeed, there is such a prodigious quan- tity of salmon and trout, in all the waters which flow through this part of Great Britain, that any particular enumeration of them is altogether unnecessary. The angler can scarcely go wrong. The waters on which he throws his fly may be of comparative value ; but he may rely on it, none will be entirely barren or unprofitable. We cannot, however, close this general and very brief sketch of the waters of Scotland, without noticing the very fine fishing which her lochs or lakes afford. These beautiful waters are so romantic by nature, and have such a halo of romance thrown over them by the sweet fictions of the past, that many thousand foreign visitors repair to them every season, for the sole purpose of gazing on their beautiful scenery, and indulging in those feelings which the associations connected with them are calculated to inspire. These lakes abound with large trout; but generally speaking they can only be obtained by means of a boat, from which the angler must make his casts; as fishing from the sides of these lochs or lakes is, for many reasons, entirely out of the question. The remarkably fine red bourne trout is to be found oc- casionally of a prodigious size in some of these mountain lochs. Prideaux Selby, Esq. (the celebrated ornitholo- gist, whose elaborate work originated the most splendid SCOTTISH RIVERS. 317 review that Blackwood's Magazine, or indeed the entire English press ever produced) and Sir William Jardine of Edinburgh have been known to kill trout of this description, in several lochs a short distance from Glasgow, full twelve pounds in weight. They were as red and as rich as the finest salmon ; and exhibited truly magnificent proofs of the skill of these accomplished anglers. In Loch Aire, as well as in some other lakes, fine large bull trout have been occasionally caught, of the enormous weight of full fifty pounds. These fish, as well as the bourne trout, must be angled for with a small trout, large minnow, or big gudgeon; and very strong tackle, combined with great skill, patience and perse- verance, is indispensably necessary. A list of these lochs is subjoined to this brief notice of Scotland; and all that is further necessary to be observed is, that the angler can scarcely make an unsuccessful, or a fruitless choice. These waters are all so abundantly sup- plied with fish, that convenience or fancy may safely guide his judgment in making a selection. &cottisf) The whole of Scotland abounds with rivers and lakes, whbh arc full of trout and salmon. Indeed, Scotland is a splendid country for the purposes of the angler. The following is a list of the principal rivers and streams, few of which will fail to fill the creel of the enthusiast, and gratify his love of fine, bold, romantic scenery. ABERDEENSHIRE. The Dee, the Don, the Urie, the Ythan, and the Deveron. ARGYLESHIRE. The Orchy, the Awe, the Wrotry, and the Aray. 318 HINTS ON ANGLING. AYRSHIRE. The Aire, the Lugan, the Doon, the Girvan, the Stinchar, the Dusk, the Glennap, and the Irvine. BANFFSHIRE. The Spey, the Avon, and the Deveron. BERWICKSHIRE. The Black-adder, the Whit-adder, the Tweed, the Eye, and the Leader. CAITHNESS. The Thurso, the Wick, the Eichen, and the Berrydale. The Thurso is celebrated for a remarkable draught offish, July 23, 1743-4, when, at one haul, there were caught two thousand, five hundred, and sixty salmon. DUMBARTONSHIRE. The Clyde, the Avon, the Gire, the Leven, and the Endrich. DUMFRIES. The Nith, the Lugar, the Cairn, the Annan, the Esk, the Ewes, the Liddle, and the Larke. MiD-LoTHiAN. The Water of Leith, the Almond, the Forth, and the Esk. ELGINSHIRE. The Spey, the Findhorn, and the Lossie. FIFESHIRE. The Leven, the Eden, the Orr, and the Lochty. FORFARSHIRE. The North and the South Esk, and the Tay. HADDINGTONSHIRE. The Tyne, and the Tester. INVERNESS. The Ness, the Oich, the Fyers, the Dun- dreggan, and the Clonnie. KINCARDINESHIRE. The Bervie, the Dee, and the North Esk. KIRKCUDBRIGHT. The Nith, the Dee, the Orr, the Deugh, the Fleet, and the Kern. LANARKSHIRE. The Clyde, the Annan, the Tweed, the Nethan, and the Avon. NAIRNSHIRE. The Nairne, the Findhorn, and the Calder. PEEBLESSHIRE. The Tweed, and the Lyne. SCOTTISH RIVERS. 319 PERTHSHIRE. The Tay, the Lochy, the Lyon, the Tunel, the Almond, and the Earn. RENFREWSHIRE. The Clyde, the Grief, the Duchal, and the Black and White Cart. Ross. The Beauly, the Launan, and the Orren. ROXBURGHSHIRE. The Tweed, the Teviot, the Ale, and the Yarrow. STIRLINGSHIRE. The Forth, the Allan, the Devon, the Carron, the Avon, the Endrick, the Doune, and the Blane. SUTHERLANDSHIRE. The Dimneis, the Naver, the Strathy, the Brora, the Fleet, and the Ailesh. WIGTONSHIRE. The Burn, the Luce, the Crea, the Tarf, and the Bladenoch. All these various rivers are fed by tributaries of more or less importance; and all the waters enumerated will afford more or less sport to the wandering angler. In the less frequented parts of the country, the chances of success are, of course, increased; and he who has the time and means at his disposal to make a protracted sojourn in the more northern districts, will have no reason to regret a visit to the wild moorlands of Ross and Sutherland. The scenery is of a character to gratify the worshipper of wild sublimity; and the sport will answer the expectation of the most ardent enthusiast. The following are the principal lochs or lakes in Scot- land Loch Achray, Aline, Arde, Arklet, Arkey, Au- nan-carp, Awe, Alglort, Cateran or Katrine, Chon, Craignish, Crinan, Dochart, Dubh, Earn, Eck, Eil, Ericht, Etive, Feochan, Fine, Fuin, Gilphead, Goil, Laggan, Leven, Luinhec, Long, Lochey, Lomond, 320 HINTS ON ANGLING. Lydveri, Lawe, Maree, Morren, Loch-na-garr, Loch-na- Keal, Ness, Oich, Rannoch, Rausa, Shin, Strathy, Tay, Treag, Vermache, and Veil, etc. IRELAND. Islets so freshly fair, That never hath bird come nigh them, But from his course through air, Hath been won downward by them. Types, sweet maid, of thee, Whose look, whose blush inviting, Never did Love yet see From heaven, withotit alighting. Lakes where the pearl lies hid, And caves where the diamond 's sleeping, Bright as the gems that lid Of thine lets fall in weeping. Glens where Ocean comes To 'scape the wild wind's rancour, And harbours, worthiest homes Where Freedom's sails could anchor. Moore. IRELAND stands next in celebrity to Scotland for salmon and trout ; and indeed, in the opinion of many experienced and accomplished anglers, is deemed fully equal to that favoured country in all its piscatory capabilities. Ireland being, comparatively speaking, a level country, most of the rivers which flow through to the ocean on all sides, have necessarily a much less rapid and precipitate current than the rivers of Scotland ; and, on this account, can scarcely, we apprehend, be fairly placed upon an equality with the trout-streams of the latter country. Still, however, there is splendid sport to be obtained in IRELAND. 321 the " Green Isle;" and the trout, in point of quality, arc, upon the whole, superior to those which are to be found even in the most favoured waters of England or Scotland. Nothing can exceed the richness and delicacy of the^e fish, when fresh caught in some of the lakes and rivers in the west of Ireland. They are as red as the finest salmon, and as firm and luscious as it is possible to imagine. On many accounts, Ireland is a delightful country for the purposes of the angler. It is, like Scotland, com- paratively free from preserved waters ; and the wandering brother of the craft must be unlucky indeed, if he en- counter any serious obstacles in his peregrinations through the country. This absence of restraint is itself a source of intense pleasure to the thoughtful and contemplative mind. In addition to this, moreover, the rambler, whose conduct is that of a fair sportsman and a gentleman, will experience the kindest treatment, and the most unbounded hospitality, from all ranks in this land of warm hearts and witty heads. It will be his own fault if his sojourn in the " Green Isle," be other than a happy and a merry one; and when, after the lapse of years, he looks back upon the perished enjoyments of the past, he will feel- ingly acknowledge, that his short visit to the " first gem of the sea," was more replete with merriment, with real, downright, hearty fun, than all the other passages of his life put together. The angler in Ireland must, on no account, omit to pay a visit to the county of Gal way; for in this district will be found in rich and varied abundance all that the most enthusiastic sportsman can possibly desire. Trout and salmon nock about the water in countless shoals ; and the fine sparkling streams wander through the most beautiful and romantic country imaginable. y 322 HINTS ON ANGLING. In the neighbourhood of Connemara, which is the wildest part of the county, the numerous landscapes are bold and romantic ; and the eye of the tourist sweeps over them with inexpressible delight. These magnificent scenes may be considered, perhaps, in some degree in- ferior to those of Killarney ; but the lofty and barren hills, the numerous lakes shut in by surrounding mountains, and the steep crags overhanging the glassy surfaces of innumerable sheets of water dotted with islands, render it difficult to acquiesce in the correctness of the preference. Certain it is, however, that nature has been all-bountiful in the vicinity of Connemara, and has displayed her charms with a liberal and lavish hand. No scenery in the western islands of Scotland can surpass the alluring prospects which meet the eye of the wanderer at every turn in these romantic fastnesses; and in no part of the British isles can the angler cast his line upon the waters under more fervid impressions of the sublime and beauti- ful, than among the wild hills of western Ireland. of tfie principal Jptsfiing Btora ann Hafces tn Ireland. ANTRIM. The Bann, Lagan, and Bush. ARMAGH. The Black water, Bann, and Newry. CARLOW. The Barrow and Slaney. CAVAN. The Woodford, Croghan, and Erne. CLARE. The Shannon and Fergus. CORK. The Black water and Lee. DONEGAL. The Foyle, Fin, S willy, Lifford, and Derg. DOWN. The Bann, Lagan, and Newry. DUBLIN. The Liffy. FERMANAGH. The Lough and the Erne. GAL WAY. The Shannon, Clair, Galway, and Dunmore. RIVERS AND LAKES OF IRELAND. 323 KERRY. The Blackwater, Feal, Gale, Brick, and Cushin. KILDARE. The LifFey, Barrow, and Boyne. KILKENNY. The Barrow, Suir, and Nore. KING'S COUNTY. The Shannon, Silver, Boyne, and Barrow. LEITRIM. The Shannon. LIMERICK. The Shannon, Maig, and Deel. LONDONDERRY. The Boyle and the Bann. LONGFORD. The Shannon, Inny, Camlin, and Fallen. LOUTH. The Boyne, Louth, and Dee. MAYO. The Moy, Munree, Deel, and Gora. EAST MEATH. The Boyne. WEST MEATH. The Boyne and Brosna. MONAGHAN. The Logan and the Fin. QUEEN'S COUNTY. The Barrow and the Nore. ROSCOMMON. The Shannon and Suck. SLIGO. The Sligo and Moy. TIPPERARY. The Suir. TYRONE. The Blackwater, Mourne, and Foyle. WATERFORD. The Suir, and Blackwater. WEXFORD. The Barrow and Slaney. WiCKLOW. The Slaney, the Bann, and Leitrim. ^Principal Uafees. Lough, Neagh, Earne, Mask, Corrib, Foyle, Ree, Allen, Lakes of Killarney, Swilly, Derg, and many others dispersed all over the Kingdom. All these rivers and lakes, are fed by numerous tribu- taries, well supplied for the most part with fish : civility and cheapness are characteristic of the country; hospi- tality to the stranger is the national motto; and the wanderer, who takes no part in the miserable religious and political squabbles which distract this fine country, will 324 HINTS ON ANGLING. find his time pass most agreeably as far as his personal comforts are concerned ; and the prolific waters will supply him with his favorite sport to his heart's content. Brother of the Angle we must part. We have opened a" wide field for the indulgence of thy innocent recreation ; and if we have contributed one single mite to thy stock of rational and contemplative enjoyment, we shall not have laboured in vain. Thou mayest possibly know something of prosperity; but thou art not so fortunate as to escape the shocks of adversity. In either case, snatch the rod, and hasten to the murmuring waters; the music of those gentle moral- ists will steal into thy heart, will aid thee to temper the one, and soothe the other. We wish thee bright streams, and breezy morns, and shadowy skies, a light bosom and a clear conscience, and so bid u God speed thee well." APPENDIX. No. I. SALMON FISHERIES. THE following particulars relative to the Salmon, con- sidered in a commercial point of view, may prove interesting to the reader. " Salmon-fisheries," Marshall observes, " are copious and constant sources of human food; they rank next to agriculture. They have indeed one advantage over every other internal produce, their increase does not lessen other articles of human subsistence. The salmon does not prey on the produce of the soil, nor does it owe its size and nutritive qualities to the destruction of its com- patriot tribes. It leaves its native rivers at an early state of growth; and going, even naturalists know not where, returns of ample size, and rich in human nourishment; exposing itself to the narrowest streams, as if nature intended it a special boon to man. In every state of savageness and civilisation, the salmon must have been considered as a valuable benefaction to this country." Such salmon as are taken in estuaries or rivers are, of course, the property of those to whom the estuaries or rivers belong ; the fisheries in them frequently letting for very large sums; but of late, very considerable quantities of salmon have been taken in exposed bays, and in the open sea, where the fishing is free to any one who chooses to engage in it. The London market, where the consumption is immense, has been, since the year 1790, principally 326 APPENDIX. supplied from the Scottish rivers. The Tweed fishery is, in point of magnitude, the first in the kingdom. The take is sometimes quite astonishing, several hundreds having been repeatedly caught by a single sweep of the net. Salmon are also despatched in fast vessels from the Spey, the Tay, and other Scottish rivers, for London, neatly packed in ice; by which method they are preserved quite fresh. When the season is at its height, and the catch greater than can be taken off fresh, then the fish are salted, pickled, or dried for winter consumption at home, and for foreign markets. Formerly, such part of the Scottish salmon as was not consumed at home, was pickled and kitted after being boiled, and was in this state sent up to London, under the name of Newcastle salmon. Within the memory of many now living, salted salmon formed a material article of household economy in all the farm- houses in the vale of the Tweed; insomuch, that in-door servants were accustomed to stipulate that they should not be compelled to make more than two meals a-week out of salmon. Its ordinary price was then 2s. the stone of 19 Ibs.; but it is now never below 12s., often 36s., and sometimes 42s. the stone. This rise in the price of the fish has produced a corresponding rise in the value of the salmon-fisheries, some of which are extremely valuable. There are considerable fisheries in some of the Irish and English rivers; but they are far inferior to those of Scotland. General Report of Scotland, vol. iii. p. 327. The Scottish salmon-fisheries seem to have attained their maximum value towards the end of the last war, when the fisheries in the Tweed were let for from SALMON FISHERIES. 327 15,000 to 18,000 a -year; and those of tlie Tay, Dee, Spey, etc., were proportionably valuable. But the value of the Scottish salmon- fisheries has, speaking generally, declined greatly of late years; in consequence, partly and principally, of a diminished supply of fish in the rivers, but in some degree also from the greater facility of communication between London and Liver- pool, and the consequent importation of fresh salmon from Ireland into the London markets. We have been fortunate enough to obtain, from a source on which every reliance may be placed, the following Account of the Quantity of Salmon packed in Ice, imported into London from Scotland, during each of the Eight Years ending on the 14 th of October, 1841, and of the Wholesale Price of the same. Years end- ing Oct. 14, 1841. Weight of Fish. Average Price per lb., about . Total Value. Ibs. d. 1834 3,432,800 H 135,900 1835 4,740,960 9 177,800 1836 2,751,840 10J 120,400 1837 3,617,600 10 150,950 1838 2,396,800 16J 104,100 1839 1,830,080 11 83,880 1840 1,697,920 11 77,850 1841 3,192,672 8| 116,400 This, it will be observed, is independent of the pickled salmon brought from Scotland, the quantity and value of which varies as much as that of the fresh salmon. But we are well assured, that on an average of the last eight years, its value has not exceeded 12,000 a-year. On an average, the retail price of salmon in London may be 328 APPENDIX. taken at from 50 to 75 per cent, above the wholesale price. We may remark, by the way, that as by far the largest portion of the salmon made use of in London comes from Scotland, the above statement shows that its consumption in the metropolis is not nearly so great as is generally supposed. In fact, it is little used except by the more opulent classes ; and nothing that is not generally used by the middle classes, or by them and the lower, is ever of much importance. The little influ- ence over prices caused l>y a large increase of supply, is also a striking feature in this return. Decrease of the Supply of Salmon, Poaching, etc. The decrease of salmon in the English and Scottish rivers, particularly of late years, is a fact about which there can be no manner of doubt (Report of Committee of House of Commons on Scottish Salmon Fishing in 1843.) Much unsatisfactory discussion has taken place as to its causes, which are probably of a very diversified character. A good deal has been ascribed to the increase of water-machinery on the banks of the different rivers; but we hardly think that this could have much influence, except, perhaps, in the smaller class of rivers. Weirs, or salmon traps, as they are called, have also been much objected to; though, as we have been assured, with still less reason. On the whole, we are inclined to think, that the falling off in the supply of this valuable fish, is principally to be ascribed to the temptation to over fish the rivers, caused by the high price of salmon to the prevalence of poaching and, more than all, to the too limited duration of the close time. In 1828, after a great deal of discussion and inquiry, an act was passed SALMON FISHERIES. 329 (9 Geo. IV., c. 39), which ha* done a good deal to remedy these defects, in so far, at least, as respects the Scottish fisheries. The rivers are shut from the 14th of September to the 1st of February; and every person catching, or attempting to catch fish during that period, is liable to a penalty of not less than l, nor more than 10, for every offence, besides subjecting himself to the forfeiture of the fish, if he have any, and such baits, nets, or other implements, as he may have been using at the time. Many penalties are also inflicted upon poachers and trespassers; and provision is made for watching and guarding the rivers. We understand that this act has had a very good effect; although it is believed that it would be better were the close time extended from the first of September to the middle of February. Previously to 1842, the importation of foreign salmon was prohibited ; but among the important and beneficial changes effected by the tariff act of that year, the repeal of this prohibition, and the admission of foreign salmon to our markets on payment of a duty of 105. 6 d. a cwt., is one of the foremost. The importation has not, how- ever, been nearly so great as was anticipated. It appears from the Customs' returns, that during the eleven months ending the 5th of December, 1843, the total imports of foreign salmon amounted to 910 cwt., 2 qrs , 7 Ibs. ; of which 824 cwt., 3 qrs., 22 Ibs. (92,394 Ibs.) were entered for consumption. This salmon was almost all brought from Holland, the anticipated imports from Norway and Sweden having turned out quite trifling in amount. The official returns do nol afford the means of discri- minating between fresh and pickled salmon; but we believe by far the larger portion of the imports during the last year (1843) was fresh. 330 APPENDIX. Return, shewing the Export of Salmon from the Port of Bergen in Norway, with the Average Prices of the same, free on board, in the years 1839, 1840 and 1841. Articles. Quantity exported. English weights and measures. Prices in Sterling, at the average rate of exchange. 1839. Smoked, 1st quality Ditto, inferior - Salted ---. Fresh, first in season Ditto, later in ditto l,374lbs. Home con- sumption 59i barrels. per Ib. per barrel nett 32lb. s. d. s. d. 10 to 8 8 toO 6 400 10 toO 8 5 to 4 1840. Smoked, 1st quality Ditto, inferior - - Salted .--. Fresh, first in season Ditto, later in ditto 1,370 Ibs. 42 barrels. per Ib. per barrel 1 1 to 9 8 to 7 400 1 1 to 9 6 to 5 1841. Smoked, 1st quality Ditto inferior - - Salted .... Fresh, first in season Ditto, later in ditto 1,170 Ibs. 26 barrels. per Ib. per barrel 1 toO 10 9 to 8 400 1 toO 10 6 toO 5 Return of the Quantities of Salmon exported from Norway in each of the undermentioned years. Year. Salted Salmon. Smoked Salmon. 1835 142 barrels 6,508 Ibs. 1836 1441 6,357 1837 106 4,758 1838 8 4,353 1839 "} 3,832 1840 368 T "V 4,441 1841 169| 7,472 SALMON FISHERIES. 331 It is enacted by statute (1 George I. st. 2. cap. 18), that no salmon shall be sent to any fishmonger or fishseller in England, of less than six pounds' weight, under a penalty ol' 51. The 58th George III. cap. 43, authorises the justices at quarter sessions to appoint conservators of rivers, and to fix the beginning and termination of the close time. The penalty on poaching and taking fish in close time is by the same act fixed at not more than 10/., and not less than 5/., with forfeiture of fish, boats, nets, etc. etc. Acts regulating the Salmon Fisheries in Scotland. I. By an act passed in the 9th year of George IV., A.D. 1828, for the preservation of the salmon-fisheries in Scotland, and repealing that of 1424, it was enacted that no salmon, grilse, sea-trout, or other fish of the salmon kind, shall be taken in or from any river, stream, lake, water, or estuary whatsoever, or on any part of the sea- coast, between the 14th day of September, and the 1st day of February. II. That such person or persons as take, fish for, or attempt to take, one or any of the fish above-mentioned, during close time, shall forfeit and pay any sum not less than one pound sterling, and not exceeding ten pounds; also that the net or engine employed by the offender shall be included in the forfeiture. III. That a trespass with intent to kill fish, shall be punished by a penalty of from ten shillings to five pounds. IV. That such as sell, or have in possession, smelts, or the young fry of the salmon, or disturb the parent fish whilst spawning, shall be fined in sums not exceeding ten pounds nor under one pound sterling. 332 APPENDIX. V. That those who take, or expose to sale, fish of the salmon kind, captured betwixt the 14th of September and the 1st of February, shall pay for each fish so exposed from one to two pounds as shall be thought proper. VI. That such person or persons as make use of lights to assist in killing fish, shall, for each offence, forfeit not less than the sum of two, and not exceeding that of ten pounds. VII. That the sum ordained by the act 1477 as a penalty for using cruives during the forbidden season, shall be raised to a fine not under five pounds nor above twenty pounds. VIII. That the occupiers of fisheries must secure, remove, or put to some other use, their boats, oars, and tackle, for the period prohibited, or otherwise incur a penalty of from two to ten pounds. IX. Provides, that the penalties above-mentioned shall go to the informer, and be recoverable before the Sheriff and Justice of the Peace Courts. X. That it shall be lawful for any two proprietors, by three several advertisements to call a meeting, at which it shall be lawful to assess one and all of the said pro- prietors, for the purpose of enforcing the said act, and appointing clerks, bailiffs, and other officers. XL That it shall be lawful to detain offenders against the above provision of the act, without any warrant, and so bring them before a justice of the peace, or other competent courts. XII. That two justices of the peace, although inter- ested, if not parties, may act against offenders, or give evidence against them. XIII. That no prosecution, unless instituted within six months of the time of committing the offence, shall hold good against the offenders. FISHERY IN FRANCE. 333 XIV. That this act shall not extend to the Tweed and its tributaries, nor to those rivers lying in the counties of Dumfries and Wigton, and the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright. No. 2. LEGAL ENACTMENTS CONCERNING FISHERY IN FRANCE. THE following extracts from the French piscatory code, may be useful to the angler in France. It is necessary to premise, that it is almost impossible to give a precise digest of these laws, because the execu- tive has the power of issuing certain ordonnances which govern different clauses of the code a prerogative which it is not slow to exercise. The articles, however, which we have extracted, still remain in full operation. LAWS OF THE 15TH APRIL, 1829. CHAP. I. ON THE RIGHT OF FISHING. ART. 1. The right of fishing shall be exercised for the benefit of the state. 1st. In all the large waters, rivers, canals, and cross- drains navigable, or capable of being navigated with boats, or rafts, the maintenance of which is at the expence of the state, or its assigns. 334 APPENDIX. 2nd. In the arms, creeks, branches and ditches which derive their water from large waters and navigable rivers, in which it is possible at all times to pass or penetrate freely in a fishing boat, and of which the maintenance is equally at the expence of the state. Provided always, that the already existing canals, and ditches, or those which shall be hereafter cut out in private properties, and maintained at the expence of the proprietors, be excepted, ART. 2. In all the rivers and canals exclusive of those which are designated in the preceding article, the pro- prietors of rivers, shall have, each on his side, the right of fishing up to the middle of the course of the river, without prejudice to any contrary right established by possession or title. ART. 5. Every individual, who shall employ himself in fishing on the larger waters, and navigable rivers, canals, streams, or water-courses of whatever description, without permission from him to whom the right of fishing appertains, shall be condemned to a fine of 25 francs at least, and 100 francs at most, independent of the injury inflicted. Moreover, a restitution of the value of the fish which have been illegally taken may be enforced, and a con- fiscation of the nets and implements of the fisher may be also pronounced. Nevertheless, it is permitted to every individual TO FISH WITH A FLOATING LINE HELD IN THE HAND,* in the large waters, rivers, and canals designated in the two first paragraps of the FIRST ARTICLE of the present law, THE TIMES OF SPAWNING EXCEPTED. * i. e. With rod and line. COMPARATIVE SCALE. 335 CHAP. IV. ON THE PRESERVATION AND POLICE OF A FISHERY. ART. 27. Whosoever shall employ himself in fishing during the seasons and hours prohibited by the ordon- nances, shall be punished by a fine of from 30 to 200 francs. ART 28. A fine of from 30 to 100 francs will be pronounced against those who shall use, at any time, or in any large water, river, canal, or stream whatever, any one of the methods or modes of fishing, or of the instruments or engines for fishing, prohibited by the ordonnances. If the offence take place during the time of spawning, the fine will be from 60 to 200 francs. ART. 29. The same fine shall be pronounced against those who shall use for any other fishing, the nets per- mitted to be employed solely for fish of a small species. No. 3. SCALE OF COMPARATIVE MEASUREMENTS OF ENGLAND AND FRANCE. Yds. ft. in. The Metre= 103^ The Kilometre = 1000 metres - - - - 1,092 1 9 The Myriametre = 10,000 metres =10 Kilometres - 10,925 2 6 The Mile 1,760 Quarter do. 440 Half do. 880 Three Quarters do. - 1,320 336 APPENDIX. TABLE In which the comparative Values of the English Mile and the French Kilometre are exhibited at one View, for the benefit of the Pedestrian in France, who will do well to copy it into his Note-book. The results are sufficiently near for all useful purposes. Kilometres. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 Yds. ft. in. Kilometres. 1,092 1 9 45 - 2,185 6 46 - 3,277 2 3 47 _ 4,370 1 48 . 5,462 2 9 49 - 6,555 1 6 50 - 7,648 3 51 . 8,740 2 52 _ 9,833 9 53 _ 10,925 2 6 54 _ 12,018 1 3 55 - 13,111 56 ^ i . 14,203 1 9 57 - 15,296 6 58 - 16,388 2 3 59 - 17,481 1 60 - 18,573 2 9 61 . 19,666 1 6 62 . 20,759 3 63 - 21,851 2 64 - 22,944 9 65 - 24,036 2 6 66 - 25,129 1 3 67 . 26,222 68 - 27,314 1 9 69 - 28,407 6 70 - 29,499 2 3 71 - 30,592 1 72 - 31,684 2 9 73 . 32,777 1 6 74 - 33,870 3 75 - 34,962 2 76 - 36,055 9 77 - 37,147 2 6 78 - 38,240 1 3 79 - 39,333 80 - 40,425 1 9 81 - 41,518 6 82 - 42,610 2 3 83 - 43,703 1 84 - 44,795 2 9 85 - 45,888 1 6 86 - 46,981 3 87 - 48,073 2 88 - Yds. ft. in. 49,166 9 50,258 2 6 51,351 1 3 52,444 53,536 1 9 54,629 6 55,721 2 3 56,814 1 57,906 2 9 58,999 I 6 60,092 3 61,184 2 62,277 9 63,369 2 6 64,462 1 3 65,555 66,647 1 y 67,740 6 68,832 o 3 69,925 1 71,017 2 9 72,110 1 6 73,203 3 74,295 2 7-5,388 9 76,480 2 6 77,573 1 3 78,666 79,758 1 9 80,851 6 81,943 2 3 83,036 1 84,128 2 9 85,221 1 6 86,314 3 87,406 2 88,499 9 89,591 2 6 90,684 1 3 91,777 92,869 1 9 93,962 6 95,054 2 3 96,147 I COMPARATIVE SCALE. 337 Kilometres. Yds. ft. in. Kilometres. Yds. ft. in. 89 97,239 2 9 95 103,795 1 3 90 98,332 1 6 96 104,888 91 99,425 3 97 105,980 1 9 92 100,517 2 98 107,073 6 93 101,610 9 99 108,165 2 3 94 102,702 2 6 100 109,258 1 Miles, Yards. Miles. Yards. 1 . 1,760 12 . 21,120 i - _ 2,200 1 - . 21,560 *' - _ 2,640 * - _ 22,000 . 3,080 i - _ 22,440 2 4 - - 3,520 13 . 22,880 0- 3 960 l _ 23,320 3 _ 4,400 4 _ 23,760 3 _ 24,200 5 280 4 14 _ 24,640 i - . 5,720 i - . 25,080 _ 6,160 h ~ . 25,520 . 6,600 \ - . 25,960 4 . 7,040 15 . 26,400 i - . 7,480 \ - . 26,840 i - . 7,920 . 27,280 _ 8,360 2 - _ 27,720 5 . 8,800 16 . 28,160 i - _ 9,240 . 28,600 * - _ 9,680 i . 29,040 . 10,120 ^ . 29,480 6 . 10,560 17 ... 29,920 J - . 11,000 } - . 30,360 ... 11,440 _ 30,800 | - . 11,880 3 . 31,240 7 - - 12,320 18 . 31,680 i - . 12,760 J - . 32,120 - 13,200 i - ... 32,560 | - . 13,640 . 33,000 8 - . 14,080 19* - ... 33,440 i 14 520 1 _ 33,880 1 - - 14,960 4 . 34,320 - 15,400 i| . 34,760 9 3 "- . 15,840 20 _ 35,200 \ - . 16,280 i 4 . 35,640 1 - . 16,720 . 36,080 3 17,160 3 36 520 i