1 68 Chub-Fishing. 



Chub-fishing is Piscator's first lesson to 

 Venator in practical angling. It is evi- 

 dently a bit of personal experience, pro- 

 bably near Amwell Magna, on the Lea, a 

 portion of that fishful'stream in which chub 

 still abound. The description is perfect, a 

 word-picture of what every chub-fisher has 

 often experienced when fishing" in a stream 

 .where these handsome fish abound. The 

 natural grasshopper, a bait often recom- 

 mended by Walton, is often far more 

 killing than a worm, and yet one nowa- 



rarely finds it used. 



My father, the " Amateur Angler," first 

 taught me to catch a trout or a chub by 

 dapping with a blue-bottle fly, holding 

 the rod over an alder bush or casting an 

 artificial fly in a stream, and in return I, 

 over five-and-twenty years after, showed 

 him how to float a dry fly over a rising 

 trout or grayling in Hampshire and 

 Derbyshire. What delightful days I have 

 had with him on our English streams, days 

 the remembrance of which makes me hope 

 the future may have many such in store ! 

 Of the nature of the chub, and the best 

 baits to use at different seasons for him, 

 Walton has left but little for later writers 



i to add ; and if this fish can be made into 

 a decent dish of food, it must surely be by 



I following his directions. 



