L60 THE PRACTICAL FISHERMAN. 



eminently satirical on this kind of fishing. I cannot forbear to give a 



part of it : 



He that searches pools and dikes. 

 Halters jacks, and strangles pikes, 

 Let him know, though he think he wise is 

 'Tis not a sport, but an assizes. ' 

 Fish to hook, were the cae disputed, 

 Are not took, but executed. 



Break thy rod about thy noddle, 



Throw thy worms and flies by the pottle, 



Keep thy cork to stop thv pottle, 



Make straight thy hook, be not afeered 

 To shave his beard. 



That in case of started stitches, 



Hook and line may mend thy breeches. 

 ****** 

 ****** 

 Hooks and lines of larger sizes, 

 Souch as the tyrant that troules devises, 

 Fishers nere believe his fable 

 What he calls a line is a cable. 

 That's a knave of endless rancour 

 Who for a hook dot h cast an anchor. 



Break thy rod, &c., &c. 



But of all men, he is the cheater 

 Who with small fish takes up the greater. 

 He makes carps without all dudgeon, 

 Makes a Jonas of a gudgeon. 

 Cruell man that stayes on gravell, 

 Fish that great with fish doth travell. 

 Break thy rod, &c., &c. 



A fly is sometimes used for pike, but with indifferent success. It should 

 be a brilliant gaudy piece of workmanship, and as unlike anything in 

 nature as possible ; at least, pike seem to take it best when it is so. I 

 remember being out with a friend at a pike lake, three miles from the 

 nearest town, when our baits failed us. We had no roach tackle, only that 

 for pike ; no artificial bait ; nothing but an old red flannel nightcap in 

 my friend's bag, and a few gimp double hooks and traces, and some mixed 

 silk for whipping, in case of an accident, in mine. My friend suggested 

 hanging the whisky-flask on our hooks; a German sausage was next 

 seriously proffered. I am afraid the latter would have succumbed in 

 slices (Blakey speaks of catching pike with bacon), but a "happy 

 thought" flashed across my mind. I seized the aforesaid nightcap, and, 

 tearing off a shred, it was soon lashed on the shank of a double hook. 

 Next I searched for a feather, and finding a pigeon's and a partridge 

 wing feather almost side by side beneath the neighbouring oak trees, I 

 whipped them on as well. Was there anything in nature like this fly ? 

 My friend roared with laughter as I attached a light spinning trace. 

 "Let those laugh who lose," said I ; "those who win are sure to do 

 so ; " as I essayed to throw this comical mockery of a fly. Well, reader, 

 the result was four brace of jack, one of the fish weighed nearly 121b. 

 I find that for proper jack fly fishing it is advisable to use light tackle ; 

 and the best results are obtained from localities where the weeds almost 

 reach the surface of the water. Autumn is the best season of the year. 

 The motion imparted to the fly is a sort of spasmodic skip. 



