FISHING AT A DISTANCE. 71 



evening (either loose or enclosed in balls of clay it 

 the stream is very rapid), five hundred on the 

 second, another five hundred on the third, and so 

 on. After the swim has been thus fed for several 

 days he expects, small blame to him, to get some 

 return for his trouble and expenditure. He fishes 

 the swim by mooring his punt twenty to thirty yards 

 above it, and casting his leger-tackle down into it. 

 The gut should be fairly stout (the novice's first 

 line and hook will do well enough) and the bait a 

 small lobworm. If the stream is strong, as it usually 

 is in a Thames barbel swim which may be ten feet 

 deep or more, a flat leger-lead specially sold for the 

 purpose will hold the bottom better than bullets. A 

 special leger-trace with a short length of gimp, on 

 which the lead runs, in the middle of it is also sold, 

 and it is worth having. A heavy lead frays gut 

 very badly, and the little piece of gimp on the 

 bottom cannot be very visible to the fish, especially 

 as it is at least two and sometimes three feet from 

 the hook. 



When he begins to fish the angler may get a bite 

 almost at once, a preliminary to remarkable sport, 

 or he may not get a bite at all. When the fish are 

 really on the feed they are caught in great quantities, 

 a catch of twenty in a day running from three up 

 to seven or eight pounds being nothing uncommon. 



