SALMON FISHING. 75 



conveyed through the line, as through a telephone, to the wielder of 

 the rod. You obtain a kind of realisation that such is the case, no 

 matter how well you have endeavoured to drive the barb home. And 

 his subsequent play shows you how well-founded your feeling was. 

 You are in constant expectation of seeing your rod point come up — 

 unwelcome sight — and if you have the luck to get the gaff home, and 

 the hook drops out of his mouth, you are not one whit astonished, 

 only thankful that your luck for once was in the ascendant, and that 

 you have not one more to add to the very considerable number of fish 

 hooked and lost. 



In the same way with a fish that "jiggers," I, rightly or wrongly, 

 always set him down as being lightly hooked, and invariably offer up 

 a thanksgiving if he be safely brought to bank. Can anyone tell us 

 why a fish so acts? It is undoubtedly most disconcerting to the angler, 

 and must assuredly have a tendency to wear the hold of the hook. 

 But if it is so effectual, why do not more fish adopt it ? Is it not 

 permissible to think that my hypothesis is right, and that a lightly- 

 hooked fish is able to appreciate that if he can only enlarge the hold 

 of the fly he may get free ? Or, if this is too much to attribute to 

 fish intelligence, what other suggestion can be made ? Of course, all 

 my argument is upset if my premise is unsound, that it is lightly- 

 hooked fish that employ the manoeuvre of "jiggering" to free 

 themselves. 



The question is, of course, difficult of solution ; at the same time, 

 I have invariably found that it is just those fish that I have already 

 set down in my mind as being lightly hooked that have resorted to 

 that expedient. 



I have always found it very advantageous to keep a good yard 

 of free casting line in my left hand, letting this slack go at the end 

 of the cast. This is exceedingly useful in getting out a long line ; 

 indeed, it has become such a part of my nature that I invariably do 

 the same in dry-fly fishing for trout. In that case I find it helps me 

 to pitch my fly more lightly, and to correct my length ; it has one 

 drawback in trout fishing, in that it prevents you from striking from 

 the reel, but it does not inconvenience me, for I merely turn the wrist 

 in striking a trout, so that the fact of my fingers gripping the line 



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