BLACKS AS FISHERMEN 201 



the lure, the gossamer becomes entangled in its teeth, 

 and it is landed by a brisk yet easy movement of the 

 wrist. A great angler recently said that throwing a 

 fly is an act of feeling or instinct rather than reason. 

 So the black boy with a careless flourish fills his dilly- 

 bag, while he smiles at the serious attempts of the 

 white man to imitate his skill. 



Owing to the brevity and the frailness of the line, the 

 catch is limited to fish under the recognised standard 

 as to size. Tests prove that the breaking strain of the 

 line is nearly three-quarters of a pound, but the weight 

 of the individual is of no great consideration, since 

 numbers are caught quickly. The gossamer is singu- 

 larly sticky. The viscid substance with which it is 

 coated is not readily dissolvable in water; indeed, water 

 seems to have the effect of hardening it, so that the line 

 wears longer than might be expected. Piquant morsels 

 of the spider are entangled in the frayed end of the 

 line as its original potency becomes non-effective. 



A friend for whose edification this novel method was 

 demonstrated thus writes it: 



"It did not take the boy long to get ready. They 

 simply broke a switch about three feet long and attached 

 a portion of the web about six inches long to the end; 

 squeezed out on to a leaf the fluid internals of the spider, 

 into which they dipped the end of the line, started a 

 rather melodious chant, and put the line in shallow 

 water. I was only a few feet away and could see no 

 fish at first, but they came very soon. They were very 

 small, about one and a half inches long. They fasten 

 their teeth in the web, and are lifted out quite slowly. 

 Some require to be pulled off the line after being landed. 

 I watched for about ten minutes, during which time 

 seventeen were caught." 



Sir William Macgreggor, ex-Governor of Queensland, 



