ON ANGLING. 123 



net. I see men fishing with elaborate and costly landing 

 nets attached to them, which are intended to shoot out to 

 great lengths to enable them to land a fish. How often is 

 the extra length of use ? How many fish do they land with 

 the longer that they could not have landed with a shorter 

 net ! And how many extra ounces of weight have they 

 been carrying about them all through the season in order 

 to land this further out fish ? I maintain that the extra 

 weight imposed by the steel contraptions incidental to the 

 telescopic handled net makes them not worth while. Get 

 a simple, light, wide-mouthed net, and sling it over one shoulder 

 with a piece of string. Lift the string over your head when 

 the fish is handy for the net, and you are ready for him. It 

 is not a beautiful device, but it has the beauty of simplicity, 

 and it does not get jammed just at the crucial moment, as 

 happens now and again to the more elaborate engines. And 

 finally, I will give you this " tip " of my own devising. Have 

 with you a little net, such as sponges are hung up in to 

 dry, and when you catch a fish of whose weight you are 

 in doubt as to whether it comes up to the limit allowed on 

 the river, put your doubtful specimen in this ; then put the 

 hook of your spring balance through a mesh or two of 

 the net, and so weigh him, allowing an ounce, or whatever 

 is right, for the net's own weight. Thus you estimate him 

 without doing him injury and can return him unhurt to 

 the river if he does not " go the weight." The ordinary 

 way of hooking the hook of the balance into the fish's 

 jaw is hateful. " They " say it does not hurt him. How 

 do " they " know ? 



Lastly (there is always a lastly after " finally," which is 

 why so many fish are caught with the " last throw " of the 

 day), call over in your mind a roll call of the things needful 

 for the day's fishing before starting in the morning, and see 

 that you have all with you, and also call it over again before 

 sending back the car that has brought you to the river. " I've 

 only known one really good day for salmon on the Wye," 

 said an old friend of mine, who had fished that great river 

 all his life, " and that was the day when I remembered, just 

 as the car went out of sight round the corner of the Builth 

 road, that I'd left my reel in it." 



