CHAPTER IV. 



RUNNING LINES. 



UNDER this head I can but briefly indicate the best lines which have 

 come under my own observation. I cannot tell here all that ia necessary 

 for the amateur to know before he can make a line for himself. It 

 is true there are small line making machines to be had, but no man 

 with any judgment at all would care to compete, or reap any benefit by 

 competing, with the line makers of Nottingham and elsewhere, in point 

 of expense or neatness. 



The old tackle makers, and those who chose to manufacture everything 

 by hand, used, variously, hemp, horsehair, and a sort of stringy sub- 

 stance called bysshus ; but the result could, in no sense, be said to 

 approach the beautiful manufactures of to-day. Besides, they were 

 rarely longer than the rod, and when the sort of implement, yclept an 

 angle, resembled that used by the prioress of St. Alban's, the only pro- 

 cedure available on the hooking of a large recalcitrant fish was to cast 

 the rod in the water, and seek to regain it when the attached and 

 struggling fish might have been supposed to be exhausted. 



Amongst almost all modern authorities within the last hundred years, 

 that is, there has prevailed a considerable diversity of opinion as to the 

 best material for a running line. Mr. Robert Blakey, writing under the 

 synonym of " Palmer Hackle," recommends a line made entirely of horse- 

 hair. Of course, this might do in the absence of a better material, but 

 it would be exceedingly expensive, and, moreover, possesses many evils, 

 which are so considerable as to disqualify it as an effective piece 

 of tackle. Then, in the first place, unless a trolling rod was possessed of 

 enormous rings, it would be almost impossible to get out more than 

 fifteen yards of line at a throw. Again, if by accident one's booted foot 

 got across it, it would instantly sever, or be so mutilated as to be 

 practically useless until mended ; and yet, again, its power of holding 



