chap, xv.] THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 205 



You must fish for him with a small red worm, 

 and if you bait the ground with earth, it is excellent. 



There is also a Bleak, or Fresh-water-Sprat, a 

 fish that is ever in motion, and therefore called by 

 some the River- Swallow ; for just as you shall ob- 

 serve the swallow to be, most evenings in summer, 

 ever in motion, making short and quick turns when 

 he flies to catch flies in the air, by which he lives, so 

 does the Bleak at the top of the water. Ausonius 

 would have him called Bleak, from his whitish colour: 



his back is of a pleasant sad or sea-water-green, his 

 belly white and shining as the mountain-snow. And, 

 doubtless, though he have the fortune, which virtue has 

 in poor people, to be neglected, yet the Bleak ought 

 to be much valued, though we want Allamot-salt, and 

 the skill that the Italians have to turn them into An- 

 chovies. This fish may be caught with a Pater-noster 

 line ; that is, six or eight very small hooks tied along 

 the line, one half a foot above the other : I have seen 

 five caught thus at one time, and the bait has been 

 gentles, than which none is better. 



Or this fish may be caught with a fine small 

 artificial fly, which is to be of a very sad brown 

 colour, and very small, and the hook answerable. 



