23 
CHAaArrER IE 
LINES AND REELS. 
Trolling lines—Ancient lines, dressings for trolling lines. Ree/-/ines for 
Jy fishing—Dressed line, silk and hair, spun cotton. Ree/-lines for 
bottom fishing—‘ Nottingham line. Gut lines—Choice of gut, 
‘drawn gut’. Staining gut—Defective stains; Mr. Stewart’s stain 
recommended red water-stain; other stains. Hair—Notto be re- 
commended; for any kind of fishing; mode of dyeing; dyeing 
feathers. Gimp—Different qualities and sizes; method of staining. 
Reels—W ooden reels or ‘ pirns,’ multipliers, plain reels, check reels, 
aluminium reels. A suggested improvement in reels. 
REEL LINES FOR TROLLING. 
VERY little seems to be known about ancient lines, 
whether for trolling, or any other fishing. We learn, 
however, that they were sometimes made of hemp, 
sometimes of horsehair, and perhaps also occasionally of 
byssus—a stringy substance by which certain species of 
mussels and pinne adhere to the rocks,—but certainly 
not of gut. That they were finely twisted, however, the 
epithets “ cuplokamos,” “ linostrophos,’ &c., sufficiently 
indicate. Finally they were very short; often barely 
the length of the rod, which was itself shorter than ours. 
Amongst our own predecessors in the gentle craft 
great differences of opinion existed as to the qualities 
