116 THE BORDER ANGLER. 



exciting runs are to be had, although, upon the whole, 

 the pike is not so lively or powerful in comparison with 

 his size as any of the salmonidse, while the tackle is 

 so strong that a great amount of force can be used in 

 exhausting him. When using the spinning-tackle, if a 

 third hook is employed about the middle of the bait, 

 the impatient angler may perhaps trust to a barb being 

 in the pike's mouth, and strike more rapidly although, 

 in doing so, we have found the pike hold on for a little, 

 as if surprised at our tugging, and then let go his hold, 

 and retreat unscathed. Should the angler be tempted 

 to try a pike-cast with a large minnow or parr-tail and 

 gut- tackle, he ought to strike at once, or the chances 

 are that if the pike swallow the bait he will sever the 

 gut with his teeth. Many people content themselves 

 with fishing for pike by means of set-lines the brass- 

 armed double hook being baited in the ordinary way 

 and thrown into a likely place, a cork attached to the 

 line suspending the bait at any depth. Eels, however, 

 when they are numerous, are apt to interfere sadly 

 with such baits and everybody is not so lucky as to 

 fall in with 20-lb. specimens of the anguillidas, as Mr. 

 Stoddart relates he did in such a case in the Teviot. 

 To be such remarkably wary and sagacious animals, 

 river-trout sometimes do singularly stupid things for 

 we once caught one, a pound and a half in weight, in 

 the Clyde in clear water, at a pike-line, the bait being 

 a two-ounce trout, with a great hook projecting on 

 each side of its mouth, and six inches of twisted brass- 

 wire connecting its tail with a strong cord ! Pike are 

 sometimes caught by setting a bait adrift suspended 

 from a bundle of rushes, a corked soda-water bottle, 



