44 



HOOKS. 



In them there are also these advantages ; the point 

 is much more beautifully sharpened than in any 

 hook I have yet met with ; in fact, it is perfect, 

 the barb being filed out of the solid, and not 

 cut and raised, as in others; and they are so 

 tough as never to straighten, even with a fifty 

 pounder ! In these two respects, O'Shaughnessy's 

 and Sell's hooks have at all events something 

 more than a fancied superiority. 



The original O'Shaughnessy is long since 

 gathered to his ancestors ; his present repre- 

 sentative is Robert O'Shaughnessy, of 18, George- 

 street, Limerick ; Sell lives in Quay-lane, Lime- 

 rick. There are many who think Phillips's hooks, 

 of O'Shaughnessy's shape, equally good, but in 

 this I cannot acquiesce. 



I cannot do less than participate in the regret 

 of Sir H. Davy, that more attention is not gene- 

 rally bestowed upon the manufacture of hooks ; 

 much of the fisherman's hopes depend on them ; 

 and how mortifying is it to lose a good fish from 

 a hook snapping ! Who, at the moment of such 

 a misfortune, would not have given twenty shil- 

 lings for the hook rather than it should have so 

 happened. 



Formerly, the old O'Shaughnessy's salmon 

 hooks were sold at sixpence each. But now the 

 nineteen sizes, trout, grilse, and salmon, of Sell's, 

 vary, according to their magnitude, from three 



