THE PIKE 



before being left to take his choice as to whether it 

 is history, fancy, or fable. How could the idea, for 

 example, have arisen that the eyes of a pike turned 

 into powder were useful as a cosmetic ? We are 

 gravely told that a stone like crystal is found in the 

 brain of a pike ; that the jawbone beaten up into 

 dust is healthful for pleurisies and other complaints ; 

 and that the heart of the fish is a remedy against 

 paroxysms. 



Some reader may be shocked if amongst the doubt- 

 ful records is here included the once universal belief 

 as to the relations between the pike and the tench. 

 For centuries it was asserted, and evidently received 

 as gospel, that the tench was really the pike's physician. 

 This was apparently based upon the assumption that 

 the predatory fish never attacked the more modest 

 tench, and even in modern times one is occasionally 

 confronted with the statement that no instance is 

 recorded of a pike attacking a tench. I have, 

 however, myself caught a pike with a light-coloured 

 tench used as a live bait. I know that many anglers 

 have made the experiment in the hope of disproving 

 the old-fashioned notion, and have failed to tempt 

 the pike into seizing a tench. The very latest work on 

 pike fishing, 'John Bickerdyke's,' deals with this 

 subject, and he states on the authority of a well- 



