ANGLING AS A REAL FIELD SPORT 21 



been taught to regard almost every form of recreation 

 as a sin to be guarded against and repented of, were 

 taught another doctrine, a new impulse was given to 

 cricket, football, and all manner of athletics, and 

 angling was quickly discovered by many to offer exer- 

 cise in variety, and to carry with it charms of its own. 

 To-day it is therefore so popular that anglers have to 

 protect themselves against one another if they would 

 prevent the depletion of lakes and rivers, and salmon 

 and trout streams are quoted as highly remunerative 

 investments. 



Let us see, however, where exercise worthy of the 

 name is found the inquiry will at the same time 

 indicate the nature of the fascinations which to not a 

 few good people are wholly incomprehensible, if, in- 

 deed, they are not a mild form of lunacy. We may 

 take for granted the antiquity of the sport, though 

 probably the first anglers had an eye to nothing nobler 

 than the pot. Angling has never been worth following 

 as an industry, for one of the first lessons learned by the 

 rod fisherman is that there are superior devices for 

 filling a basket if that alone is the object. " Because 

 I like it," is the least troublesome reply to one who 

 asks you why you will go a-fishing. Happy he who 

 can go a little further and aver, " Because I find it 

 the most entrancing of sports." And with equally 

 sound sense may it be urged by old and young alike, 

 " Because it is splendid exercise." 



Angling in truth is often made much severer than 

 it need be. The American fishing-men, in their in- 

 stinctive search for notions, discovered long ago that 

 the rods which they had copied from us were too long 

 and heavy, and the necessary tackle altogether too 

 cumbersome. They seldom use a longer salmon-rod 

 than 15 feet, and frequently kill the heavy trout of 



