A HISTORY OF SUFFOLK 



May, and while spawning are sometimes poached 

 with a common landing-net. In former times 

 the marshmen with drag or seine nets used to 

 sweep them off the spawning grounds when they 

 were shoaling in Lent, as they then commanded 

 a ready sale in the inland towns ; in midsummer 

 rudd take the fly freely and afford good sport. 



Pike are plentiful in every pool connected with 

 a stream. In the principal rivers and lakes they 

 run to 30 Ib. A pike exceeding 1 5 lb., however, 

 is seldom killed. 



The grey mullet was a common annual 

 visitor to Breydon, shoals coming up in the 

 summer-time; and in the deeper water that 

 then obtained (some of the flats being scarcely 

 ever dry) it revelled among the vegetation growing 

 there, the species known locally as ' sea-cabbage ' 

 ( Ulva /actuca), together with the molluscs living 

 upon it, being eaten by this fish. From the time 

 when the ' Dickey Works ' a kind of break- 

 water to the ebbs coming from the Waveney 

 and Yare were constructed, prior to the 

 forties, the flats commenced to silt up, while 

 the channel deepened. From that time till now 

 the mullet has come in lessening shoals each year, 

 until what was once a remunerative fishery, giving 

 employment to several Breydoners, has entirely 

 ceased. 



Among other unusual catches upon Brey- 

 don Water within the past twenty years may be 

 mentioned a sturgeon weighing 1 1^ stone and 



7 ft. 6 in. in length. Other somewhat smaller 

 sturgeon have been taken there. A large skate 

 was once shot in the shallows by a punt gunner. 



In summer large shoals of grey mullet some- 

 times find their way to Oulton Broad, but it is 

 useless to fish for them with any bait, although 

 elsewhere they afford excellent sport. In conse- 

 quence they are obtained by various methods of 

 spearing. Casting from the beach has always 

 been a favourite practice upon the Suffolk coast. 

 From a four-foot stick, notched at the end, a long 

 weighted line is thrown to a distance of about 

 a hundred yards ; the line carries from a dozen to 

 fifteen hooks. 



In 1903, when the East Coast Development 

 Company put out their piers at Lowestoft, 

 Southwold, and Felixstowe, some of the more 

 scientific anglers introduced legering with the 

 rod. A Sea Anglers' Fishing Society, consisting 

 of several hundred members, was then formed 

 at Lowestoft. Fishing competitions for prizes 

 are organized, and visitors come great distances 

 to participate therein. Fishing with hand-lines 

 as well as with rods from boats in the roadstead 

 is also in high favour, and very heavy baskets 

 are annually recorded. One prize-winner in 

 1905 landed seventeen cod weighing 170 lb., 

 whilst another boat brought in 300 whiting as 

 the result of a few hours' fishing, but these are 

 exceptional ; the average catch being a few score 

 per boat carrying two or three rods. 



RACING 



The ancient flat-race meetings of Ipswich, 

 Bungay, and Beccles having been abandoned, 

 Suffolk has little claim to notice as a racing 

 county. The fine course on which the Cam- 

 bridgeshire was run for thirty years or more, 

 after its establishment in 1839, is in Suffolk, but 

 is now used only for a race decided on the Friday 

 of the Houghton week. The Suffolk Stakes 

 course the last mile and a half of the Round 

 Course is the longest course now used ' Behind 

 the Ditch,' and the Ellesmere Stakes course of a 

 furlong less, but finishing at the bottom of the 

 hill, is more popular in both weeks. Part of the 

 town of Newmarket and the training grounds 

 are in Suffolk, but the course or running tracks 

 are in Cambridgeshire. Charles II, who spent 

 a good deal of his time at Newmarket, spoke of 

 it as ' the little horse-racing town in the corner 

 of Suffolk.' 



The date when Ipswich Races were instituted 

 is not recorded, but they are supposed to be 

 nearly as ancient as those of Newmarket. Refer- 

 ence occurs in old ballads to the meeting, and 

 local records contain no mention of the date 

 when the brick stand (pulled down a year or 

 two ago) was built, or by whom it was erected. 

 Admiral Rous once stated during a visit to the 



town that Ipswich meeting was in existence long 

 before the Stuart period, but on what authority 

 does not appear. The Ipswich meeting was 

 sufficiently important in the early Georgian 

 period to be the scene of a race for one of the 

 royal plates, which in 1785 was won by Camel 

 a son of Mambrino. The following affords a 

 good idea of the social conditions under which the 

 sport was carried on at the end of the eighteenth 

 century : 



Tuesday, July 4. Public Breakfast and Ball at the 

 Coffee House as usual. Second day at the Great 

 White Horse. Third day at the Golden Lion. By 

 particular desire there will be an ordinary for the 

 ladies at the Coffee House on the third day of the 

 Races. 



On the first day of the meeting the race was 

 His Majesty's Purse of 100 guineas run in three 

 heats and won by Mr. Loder's Pilot, who beat 

 Mr. Clarke's Schoolboy and Mr. Patch's Briar. 

 On the second day the Gentlemen's Purse of 

 50 sovereigns brought out two starters only. 

 Mr. Patch's Briar beat Mr. Harwood's Parling- 

 ton in both the heats run. On the Thursday 

 Sir C. B. Bunbury's Volatile, being the only 

 horse entered, received 25 and the entrance 

 money. 



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