PERCH-FISHING 65 
Walton remarked of a fishing reel, which he had never seen, 
and as lesser men might observe of ghosts or ping-pong, or 
ThePater- 4 fashionable lady’s hat, which ‘‘is to be observed 
nostere better by seeing one of them than by a large demon- 
stration of words.” To the running line is attached a gut 
trace about four feet long, with a small leaden plummet at the 
end thereof, and to this trace are looped at intervals three 
pieces of fine salmon gut five inches long, each armed with 
a hook. The uppermost hook is generally baited with a live 
minnow, the two lower ones with choice earthworms. The 
paternoster is used without a float ; the plummet is dropped 
into those parts of the water which experience points to as the 
likeliest haunts for perch—hollow banks, tree roots, piles, camp- 
sheating by locks and weirs, and, in lakes, especially along the 
margins of beds of that dark green, round-stemmed rush which 
some people call bulrush, while others apply that name to the 
reedmace. One place after another should be tried; the 
presence of feeding fish is signified by a sharp tug on the line, 
which should be kept moderately taut ; where one fish is, good 
sport may be expected, for perch are seldom solitary swimmers. 
The paternoster, however, is an elaborate artifice which is 
seldom resorted to except in the neighbourhood of large towns, 
Floatfish- Where fish have become scarce and wary. Nine 
ing. anglers out of ten content themselves with a float 
and a single hook, baited with a worm or small live fish. 
Floats are of many varieties, from the homely cork to the 
delicately fashioned quill; but they fall under two principal 
kinds—the stationary float, for fishing in still water, and the 
travelling float, for streams into which a skilful Nottingham 
angler will search the ground to a distance of seventy or eighty 
yards below where he stands. 
Perch may be taken by the spinning bait, but inasmuch as 
they swim in shoals, confined to a limited extent of water, the 
live bait is found a more profitable means of capture. They 
also take the artificial fly, but this is only exceptionally successful. 
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