194: FISHING IN AMERICAN WATERS. 



of split bamboo rod, handled by expert anglers. The natives 

 tie on their click reel ; and for guides and top, use loops of 

 leather or raw-hide. . 



Reprenons notre Discours. Of bait-fishing nothing seems 

 more simple to the uninitiated than to be able successfully 

 to angle with a worm. Mere urchins have succeeded with a 

 rough stick, linen line, and clumsy hook, more clumsily tied 

 on, and covered with a worm, in landing a goodly-sized fish. 

 But this is a mere matter of luck, and it would be absurd to 

 classify the performance among the efforts of scientific bait- 

 anglers. 



Entertaining, as I really do, great respect for many bait- 

 fishers of trout, I the more cheerfully present the following 

 opinion from the genial angler and man of genius, Thomas 

 Tod Stoddart, whose " Companion" and *" Anglers' Rambles 

 and Songs" have afforded me so much pleasure and instruc- 

 tion: 



" It may perhaps startle some, and those no novices in the 

 art, when I declare, and offer moreover to prove, that worm- 

 fishing for trout requires essentially more address and expe- 

 rience, as well as better knowledge of the habits and instincts 

 of the fish, than fly-fishing." He does not refer to the prac- 

 tice followed in brooks and petty streams, nor as pursued 

 after heavy rains in discolored waters, and goes on to say : 

 "My affirmation bears solely on its practice as carried on 

 during the summer months in Scotland, when the waters are 

 clear and low, the skies bright and warm. Then it is, and 

 then only, that it ought to be dignified as sport ; and sport 

 it assuredly is, fully as exciting, perhaps more so than angling 

 with the fly or minnow." 



As I agree in the method recommended by this teacher, I 

 will give its principal features, and leave with the angler to 

 decide in his course of practice between us. u The rod should 

 approach seventeen feet in length, but light, top pieces some- 

 what stiff, of lance or hickory." 



The common trouting-line of stained silk and hair, tapering 



