24 MODERN SEA FISHING 



and baits are common knowledge among them all ; but the older 

 and more experienced men often have special and very valuable 

 knowledge, more particularly as to fishing grounds, and this 

 they very wisely like to keep to themselves. One year I did a 

 good deal of bass fishing from small luggers in a tideway on 

 the Welsh coast. The little port from which we started was a 

 watering-place ; but the sport came on after the visitors had 

 departed, and many local professional fishermen went after 

 these bass for the market. There was not much fishing ground ; 

 the place was well known ; and a little fleet of four or five 

 boats would be sailing over it as long as the tide served, for the 

 bass only seemed to feed there during the best of the flood. 

 We all used much the same tackle and baits ; but there were 

 two boats which always brought home more fish than any of 

 the others, and one of them most of all. I would have given 

 a very great deal to have discovered the secret of her crew's 

 success, and I watched them very closely ; but, so far as I could 

 perceive, there was no appreciable difference at all between our 

 methods, unless, indeed, their boat was handled rather better 

 than the rest. Lead, line, tackle, speed of the boat, and place 

 of fishing, all seemed exactly the same. 



A taste for sea fishing often leads to a taste for yachting, 

 or, at least, small-boat sailing. Whilst I must confess that a 

 knowledge of nautical matters is not absolutely necessary for 

 success in sea fishing, nevertheless it is desirable that anyone 

 who places himself at the mercy of wind and wave should 

 know how to handle a tiller, hoist or lower a sail, and take a 

 turn to windward. Curious accidents sometimes happen. It 

 is a very unpleasant thing, should the boatman be disabled by 

 a sudden illness, or tumble overboard, or require to leave the 

 helm to clear some little hitch in the running rigging, if his 

 employer cannot take the tiller or otherwise render assistance. 

 The more deeply a man goes in for acquiring a knowledge of 



