112 BAIT FISHING. 



ble an authority, Cotton's opinion is incorrect ; as it must be known 

 to every experienced angler that a trout will reject one sort of 

 worm, and yet greedily devour one of another kind. 



A singular instance of this is still fresh in my memory, though 

 it must have occurred at least twenty years since. On the occasion 

 I allude to I had ridden some distance to fish in a part of the 

 Test a few miles below Romsey. As I intended to troll with a 

 minnow, I had taken a small bag of worms with me, purposing to 

 catch my baits with a hook and line ; but scarcely had I taken 

 sufficient minnows to begin my sport, than the sun burst out 

 through the clouds, and the sky, which had previously been over- 

 cast became so perfectly clear that any hope of trolling to any 

 purpose in those limpid waters I soon found to be impracticable. 

 Resolved not to return home utterly empty if I could help it, I 

 tried my skill with a worm in some of the smaller watercourses 

 that flowed through the meadows. At first I tried with two brand- 

 lings, such being usually the best baits for bright weather and a 

 clear water, and with these I fished down a watercourse in which 

 I suspected there was more than one lusty trout, but without even 

 obtaining a nibble ; at last I chanced to discover a lobworm or two 

 amongst the other worms in my bag, and putting one of these on, 

 I very shortly after got hold of a good sized trout, which I had the 

 luck to catch. This encouraged me to retry with that same kind of 

 worm the identical ground I had previously fished over without success 

 with the brandling, and before I had retraced one half of it I had 

 taken several more fine trout, when I had the mortification to dis- 

 cover, or rather not lo be able to discover, another lobworm in my 

 bag. I then tried a red worm, hoping that might do/ hut this 

 succeeded no better than the brandlings had done before. At last 

 I was much tantalized at perceiving a noble great fellow of a trout 

 lying in a shallow evidently on the look out for food ; but it was 

 in vain I kept myself closely hidden from his sight behind a willow 

 bush, and drifted the bait most temptingly past him, having run 

 nearly the whole length of line off my reel for the purpose, for he 

 merely followed the worm for a short distance, and after examin- 

 ing it, and finding it unsuited to his ta&te, turned back most pro- 

 vokingly without touching it, and resumed his former position. 

 Like a blockhead, instead of leaving him quiet a few minutes, I put on 

 a couple of brandlings and drifted these down, but he would not con- 

 descend even to notice these, though they must have passed within 



