62 TRIMMER ING. 



quite, as freely as a live one, or a bait so cleverly 

 spun as to have the appearance of vigorous life. 



To bait with a dead fish, it is merely necessary 

 to pass the gimp by means of a baiting-needle 

 right through it from the mouth to the fork of the 

 tail : there is no need of tying. The bullet, which 

 lies at the bottom when the line has been thrown 

 in a few yards from the shore, will give the play, 

 the lighter bait floating above it in the most capti- 

 vating manner, and, if not too heavy, offering no 

 appreciable resistance to the removal of the sup- 

 posed victim to the lair of the savage ogre, who 

 conveys it thither to be devoured. I think that, 

 unless very ravenous, a pike never bolts his fish at 

 the moment of capture. He seizes him by the 

 head or across the body, holds him hard and fast, 

 and retires to his resting-place among the weeds 

 to swallow him in private. Night-lines should 

 always be laid in the neighbourhood of weeds. 



Except dead fish, however, the pike eschews 

 dead animals as food. He may be taken by what 

 is called a fly, which he no doubt mistakes for a 

 young duck, or rnoor-hen, or a water-rat ; but in 

 such case the strike must, as we shall hereafter 

 explain, be instantaneous. No sooner is the sham 

 bait taken into the mouth, than it is ejected with 

 a force, common to all fish, but to me perfectly 



