CHUB FISHING. 183 



bent upon having it. A practised fly fisherman will adapt himself 

 to these methods in a very short time. To the tyro one can only 

 say that it does not matter how heavily the fly, bunch of gentles, 

 or frog alights on the water. The chief thing to be attended to is 

 the keeping oneself out of sight. As Chub lie very close under 

 low hanging boughs, some little risk must be run in endeavouring 

 to throw under such. When a Chub is hooked it must be held, 

 or it will probably rush behind a root and be lost. The first rush 

 of a big Chub is very powerful, so the tackle must be strong ; but 

 after the first rush the fish generally gives in, though in lively 

 streams I have seen a Chub afford excellent sport. 



A cockchafer, or two or three grasshoppers make capital baits 

 for Chub, but throwing them a la fly is a delicate operation. As 

 they do not sink they may be allowed to float when once thrown, 

 and if there be any stream it may carry them over fish. 



Fishing for Chub with the fly rod is certainly more adapted to 

 the upper than to the lower portions of the Thames. For fishing 

 these last-named, no style of angling is more adapted than the 

 Nottingham, which is conducted with a free running reel, carrying 

 perhaps a hundred yards of fine line of twisted silk, with a large 

 quill or cork float. To use this tackle with success it is by no 

 means indispensable to fish from a boat, if the angler can meet 

 with places where the bank juts out and forms a narrow stream, or 

 where two streams converge ; but the employment of a craft of 

 some kind confers great advantages in enabling the angler to 

 shift his ground, which is very necessary in Chub fishing. No 

 experience is more common in angling for this fish than to catch 

 one of a shoal at once, and later on to discover that the remainder 

 have taken fright and departed. 



