52 DACE CAUGHT WITH SPINNING-BAIT. [PART I. 



look at the bread which I offered them, being 

 doubtless gorged with Carp-spawn. I have indeed 

 not unfrequently detected them apparently in the 

 very act, observing them at intervals dashing ra- 

 pidly about, close in the wake of Carp which were 

 engaged in spawning. But if Roach do, as I think 

 there can be no doubt, thus make free with the 

 spawn of Carp, yet I suspect they are useful to the 

 parent fish in relieving them from water-lice, with 

 which they are occasionally much infested. This 

 suspicion is grounded on the fact that having seen 

 Carp on the surface, with Roach swarming closely 

 round them, and, on several occasions, by foul- 

 hooking or otherwise, managed to take them from 

 out of the middle of such company, I invariably 

 found them to be suffering from these parasites. 

 When in this state they rapidly lose condition, 

 and sometimes become so poor and weak that they 

 will suffer themselves to be taken out of the water 

 with the hand. 



I know of two instances where Dace have 

 been caught with a spinning-bait, not hooked 

 foul, but fairly in the mouth. One of these 

 was by Mr Gould, the fishing-tackle maker, in 

 the Colne : the other by a brother of mine in 

 a piece of water in Hampshire; the bait in the 



