212 BOOK OF THE BLACK BASS. 



short, light and pliant rod of the present day. And not 

 only has the length and weight of bait rods been reduced, 

 but fly-rods of all patterns have been reduced at least a 

 foot in length, during the past five years, to their great 

 advantage. 



The Henshall Black Bass Minnow Rod. 



While a rod may vary somewhat, according to the mode 

 of angling, there is no good reason for such a wide diver- 

 sity of opinion as obtains on the question of Black Bass 

 rods. For instance : Fishing from the bank of a swift 

 and narrow stream, wading the bars of a wide river, or 

 fishing from a boat on a quiet lake, seem in themselves 

 apparently very different processes; but in reality they 

 are only slightly different means of securing the same end, 

 viz : the capture of the Black Bass with a minnow for 

 bait — for my remarks apply only to bait fishing — and a 

 properly constructed rod would answer in either place 

 and fulfill either condition, when accompanied by a light, 

 freely rendering reel, together with a fine trout line. An 

 artistic angler, fishing for Trout or Black Bass with the 

 fly, would use his fly-rod in either place ; from a boat, 

 from the bank, or while wading the stream ; he would 

 use the same rotl under any and every circumstance, wher- 

 ever he had room to make a cast. The Black Bass bait 

 fisher will in time become as consistent as the fly fisher, 

 but it will only be when he adopts the proper rod, which 

 rod I will now endeavor to describe. 



I start out with the proposition that a first-class Amer- 

 ican, single-handed Trout fly-rod is, per se, the very per- 

 fection of rods and the chef'doeuvreof the rod-maker's art. 



