CHAP. xx. Spoons and Split Rings. 273 



Spoons. Spoon baits also should be mounted with the same 

 hooks specially for India, and should, for the reason already given 

 (pp. 52, 60), be made of thicker metal than fishing spoons ordinarily 

 are. I like them as thick as a good teaspoon, and gilt on one 

 side, silvered on the other. The sizes for Mahseer spoons are from 

 3 inches in length in the bowl downwards to ii inches, 3 and 2f 

 inches being used in deep pools where the biggest fish are expected, 

 and where the spoon is required to show further down into the depths, 

 but 2| and 2 inches being preferable for general use, while some 

 devotees of specially light tackle never use anything bigger than 

 1 1 inches. The two smallest sizes, 2 and if inches, spin best, I 

 think, for being hogbacked ; and in the larger sizes I prefer the bowl 

 rounded in the shape of a dessert-spoon, rather than narrowed, as I 

 think they get a better hold of the water, and can be spun at a lower 

 speed of traction than the narrower ones. Two and a half inches in 

 the bowl is just the size of a dessert-spoon, and is my general favourite. 



For the reasons given below in connection with rust-eaten gut, it is 

 desirable that the ring in the spoon to which the gut trace is attached 

 should be of some material that does not rust like the steel split ring 

 ordinarily used. German silver or brass, or aluminium or an aloid 

 may be substituted with advantage. 



Split Rings. And split rings must unquestionably be abhorred. 

 They are an abomination. No matter how stout they may be, and 

 how strong when new, they very soon become utterly untrustworthy 

 and fail you with your first big fish. It stands to reason that they 

 are bound to do so from their very formation. By the law of 

 capillary attraction the split in the ring is bound to fill with water 

 the first time you use it, and equally bound to retain water when 

 laid by, and you cannot get at it to wipe it off, cannot even see it ; yet, 

 if you consider, you know it is bound to be there, and bound to be 

 rusting, and thus the little split ring has two outsides and four insides, 

 all simultaneously exposed to continuous rusting. The inevitable result 

 must be its being rapidly rust eaten to a rotten thread. The action of 

 rust is quick, and Byron was correct when attributing to a single night's 

 exposure " the rust on his mail." 



" And there lay the rider, distorted and pale, 

 With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail." 



Tackle-makers are predisposed to using split rings, because they are 



THE ROD IN INDIA. T 



