THE COMPLETE ANGLER 



209 



will make it a most excellent paste : but when you fish 

 with it, you must have a small hook, a quick eye, and a 

 nimble hand, or the bait is lost and the fish too ; if one 

 may lose that which he never had. With this paste 

 you may, as I said, take both the roach and Dace or 

 Dare, for they be much of a kind, in matter of feeding, 

 cunning, goodness, and usually in size. And therefore, 

 take this general direction for some other baits which 

 may concern you to take notice of. They will bite 

 almost at any fly, but especially at ant-flies ; concerning 

 which, take this direction, for it is very good : 





DACE 



Take the blackish ant-fly out of the mole-hill or ant-hill, 

 in which place you shall find them in the month of June, 

 or if that be too early in the year, then doubtless you 

 may find them in July, August, and most of September ; 

 gather them alive with both their wings, and then put 

 them into a glass that will hold a quart or a pottle ; but 

 first put into the glass a handful or more of the moist 

 earth out of which you gather them, and as much of 

 the roots of the grass of the said hillock, and then put 

 in the flies gently, that they lose not their wings : lay 

 a clod of earth over it, and then so many as are put into 

 the glass without bruising, will live there a month or 

 more, and be always in a readiness for you to fish with ; 

 but if you would have them keep longer, then get any 



