loS THE PIKE. 



This volume, therefore, would be incomplete 

 without a description of the modus operandi of 

 trolling, which, in fact, is fishing with a dead 

 gorge-bait. 



In 1662 Nobbcs, the " Father of Trollers," pub- 

 lished his Complete Trailer, in which he dissemin- 

 ated sounder views and some improvements on the 

 methods previously practised in this department of 

 pike-fishing. 



Since Nobbes' time great advances have been 

 made in the art of angling ; the old-fashioned 

 tackles of our forefathers have been displaced by 

 more perfect ones of modern construction ; and 

 for those who care to fish for jack and pike 

 before the weeds are down a day's trolling is 

 possibly (where .it is allowed) amusing. As the 

 angler strolls along the banks of some weedy 

 water, he may (as J. J. Manley suggests in his 

 Fish and Fishing} flatter himself " that, etymo- 

 logically, 'trolling' and 'strolling' have one and 

 the same meaning, as indeed some etymologists 

 aver," making it out to be "fishing as you stroll." 

 Besides the great objection to gorge-fishing (with 

 either a live- or dead-bait), that it involves almost 

 every fish taken, large or small, being killed, there 

 is the great loss of time . incurred by waiting for 

 the fish to " pouch " the bait ; and then, after a 

 delay of eight or ten minutes to give them time 

 to do so, there is the constant disappointment of 

 finding the jack has rejected, or only been playing 

 with, the bait, or that no jack took it at all, or, 

 maybe, the bait had hung up in a weed. The 

 advice of the old gentleman (in Punc/i) to the 

 youthful angler at his side who was gorge-fishing, 

 was "Never hurry a jack, Tom." The picture 



