i ii U'T. win Mahseer Hooks. 221 



and expect to get him out by the next overland parcel post. Sou 

 will have tn tell them that it is the treble hook called by the hook 

 makers extra-stout The ordinary tackle-maker, who is not edn 

 oated tn thr supply of Indian tackle, is sure to have none of these 

 hunks in his Bhop. He never deals in them, has prohably never 

 seen them, and does not know how to order them of the hook 

 maker, even if he sees them. Tell him they are railed extra stout, 



BS 1 said above, and that such hooks you must have. It will 

 -lii.ik his sensibilities doubtless, his refined eye recoiling from 

 anything bo clumsj . 



Moreover, he considers it no compliment to oiler such a hook tn 

 a sportsman, as if lie had not fine enough hand tn kill a fish on an 

 ordinary hook ; and. indeed, it might be considered an insult, if the 

 juill of the fish was the only tiling to he afraid of. But that is not 

 the difficulty at all, it is the very unusual power of compression 

 exercised by the Mahseer, the violent chop with which he seizes 

 his fish, that crushes an ordinary treble hook before you feel your 

 fish at all, as explained at length in Chapter IV. 



My readers being mainly Indians, some of whom had come 

 out to India without ln-inu' innoculated with 



Tuokle shops. . . . 



the fishing virus, 1 telt m my former edition 

 that they, some of them, might not know where to look for tackle 

 shops; and in those days, the days of my first edition, few tackle- 

 makers knew anything about Mahseer, and the special hooks 

 needed for them. It was specially due to my readers, therefore, 

 that I should mention shops in which these hooks were kept. 1 

 mentioned, therefore, C. Farlow, 191, Strand ; and Bowness, 230, 

 strand, as the only ones I knew. Since then, however, letters to the 

 "Field" have been frequent, and much more is known to tackle- 

 makers generally about Mahseer, ami perhaps my little book itself 

 has added its mite to spread the knowledge; and anglers have 

 talked to their tackle-makers so that it would seem invidious at 

 this date to single out and mention any particular shops, as if thej 

 were the only ones that could supply the proper articles. Any 

 tackle-maker that you are accustomed to deal with can equally 

 supply you, if only you will be at the pains, in ordering, to suffi- 

 ciently particularize tin- tackle, ami especially the hooks, as I have 

 set them down for you. Of course I am writing only for such as 

 need such aid. It is of no use your simply referring your tackle- 



