Il6 THE PERCH. 



quarry by the size of his mouth, and not by the size of his 

 stomach at all, for some odd times it would be an utter im- 

 possibility for him to swallow the bait he ran at. The most 

 extraordinary case that I ever heard off, was a little perch 

 of only five or six ounces running at and getting hooked on 

 a gigantic spoon, that a friend had purchased to use for 

 large pike in one of the Irish lakes. He laid the fish in 

 the bowl of the spoon, like a herring on a dish ; whatever 

 that perch took a six inch spoon to be, is merely a matter 

 of speculation. I have taken half and three quarter 

 pounders on pike baits, that it was utterly impossible for 

 him to swallow ; they seemed to me to be like the boy in 

 the nursery rhyme, whose eyes were bigger than his belly. 

 As a fish for the table perch are Ai, being remarkably firm, 

 white, and sweet in the flesh. It is not much good trying 

 to scrape the scales off ; the best plan to prepare them for 

 the table is to cut off the head, tail, and fins, remove the 

 insides, and wash them well inside and out, dry them 

 thoroughly with a cloth and drop them in a frying pan 

 among a liberal supply of boiling lard. As soon as they 

 are cooked sufficiently on one side turn them over, and re- 

 peat the dose on the other. The skin and scales will all 

 slip off together as soon as the cooking is completed. I 

 am wonderfully fond of a dish of good river perch, and 

 consider them better than a good fresh haddock, and equal 

 to a lemon sole. With regard to the rod, reel, line, and 

 tackle necessary for perch fishing, there is no need for any- 

 thing very special, except an odd item or two. for extra- 

 ordinary purposes. A good strong roach rod, eleven feet 

 long, or a decent chub rod with an extra short top for oc- 

 casional spinning, will be plenty good enough without run- 

 ning to the expense of a special rod for perch. The reel 

 also can be a plain, easy going Nottingham, three and a 

 half inches in diameter, or the centre pin reel I so carefully 

 described in the vol. on barbel and chub fishing. The 

 line also can be the stout roach or the chub line, say a 

 No. 7 or No. 6 at the outside, and of undressed plaited silk, 

 in fact, you cannot do better than use the rod, reel, and 

 line I describe in Vol. I for chubbing down the streams. 

 Perch tackle should be fairly fine, I don't recommend the 



