68 Hun-, When.avd Where to Fish for Mahseer. Chapt. vi. 



rocks, snags, falls, etc., though when the rapid is strong it requires 

 to descend tail foremost, so as to regulate its pace by partial 

 swimming. When swimming down head foremost, what with 

 the force of the current and its own swimming, it ordinarily moves 

 more rapidly than when sauntering up stream. Besides which, 

 it never goes down stream, except in rapid pursuit of some food 

 that has been carried past it, or for the purpose of returning to, 

 and again taking up, the post of observation it has lately left. 

 Whereas, when coming up stream, fish often saunter upwards, 

 watching for what the stream shall carry down on either side of 

 them, lazily stemming the current, and frequently remaining 

 stationary. At such times when moving most leisurely, and when 

 most intent on their own food, they must offer much better oppor- 

 tunities for being surprised by big fish than when moving more 

 rapidly ; I should conclude, therefore, that it is the position in 

 which the larger predacious fish are most on the look-out to take 

 them at advantage. It is, therefore, a movement which I should 

 think it advisable to imitate, or rather I should imitate it much 

 oftener than 1 should the swimming down stream. In pulling 

 your bait up stream, also, it is easy to vary the motion by letting 

 it be stationary, at times, where the current is strong enough to 

 make it spin, and to keep it off the bottom, and where the stream is 

 more than ordinarily rapid, you can occasionally imitate the motion 

 of a fish letting itself lie lazily carried downwards by the stream. 

 To do that you must not slack off entirely, because if you do, your 

 lish will be carried downwards like a dead thing, whereas it should 

 appear like a fish just keeping its m.se to the stream, but letting 

 itself drop backwards. Do not take off the tension on your bait 

 altogether, but lessen it, continuing to just feel it, so that you will 

 be keeping your bait's nose to the stream, and be ready to feel at 

 once if you get a run. But if you draw your bait across the stream, 

 you will show it to many more lish, and therefore have, in my 

 opinion, a much better chance of taking one; and that is on the 

 whole my favourite throw, sometimes letting the bait describe a 

 semicircle by simply keeping the top of the rod still, and letting 

 the stream, when strong enough, do the rest; and sometimes 

 drawing the bait right across, or half across half up, varying it 

 each throw so as to search all w atev, and because it is said that 

 " variety is charming." 



