THE PiKE. 



57 



Trent anglers who lived at Newark-on-Trent, who used to 

 spin for pike in a manner that I should suppose to be a sur- 

 vival of the most ancient form of trolling known. This old 

 angler's name was Crosby, and there are fishermen still liv- 

 ing at Newark who can very well remember him. He used 

 neither rod nor reel, but simply a coil of very stout cord, 

 about as thick, I should say, as a sea-fishing hand-line, which 

 he carried in his left hand, with one end tied tightly round 

 the same arm above the elbow. His tackle was simply a 

 length of stout gimp with one or twO' large swivels, and a 

 long heavy pipe or barrel lead. The gimp was mounted 

 with one only very large treble hook, and this gimp was 

 threaded through the bait, the hook being underneath be- 

 tween the vent and the tail. This tackle was thrown by 

 hand, and in spinning the bait home the line was drawn in 

 by the right hand and laid in coils on the left. Of course 

 all fish hooked had to be played by hand. I cannot remem- 

 ber seeing this angler at work myself, but I knew him very 

 well, and have been assured by old fishermen that years ago 

 he used to kill many and heavy fish by that very primitive 

 style and tackle. There are many tackles in use for spin- 

 ning a dead bait that are a good deal more ingenious than 

 useful, that is some of them, at least are so. The main 

 object of the inventors of these tackles appears to be a desire 

 to save the angler from being at any trouble in the matter, 

 and also to secure a very brilliant and even spin. One of 

 the oldest of these is the Chapman spinner, which I should 

 say is familiar to anglers in every part of the civilized globe 

 where fish that will take a spinning bait are to be found. 

 For the information of those who don't know what it is, I 

 may say that it has a leaded brass wire with a hook some 

 two-thirds of the distance down it, which is thrust in the 

 mouth and down the belly of the bait. At the top of the 

 leaded wire, close to the mouth of the bait, there are sol- 

 dered on a couple of fans, one being bent one way and the 

 other in an opposite direction, somewhat on the Archim^ 

 dean screw principle, that gives the bait its rotary movement 

 without having to curl the tail. A swivel is fixed at the top 

 end above these projecting fans, from which depends a 

 couple of short lengths of gimp; two treble hooks are firmly 



