142 AN ANGLER'S YEAR 



holiday, within two hours' rail from our baking city 

 Many will look with scorn upon such fishing, and say 

 how much they prefer the dashing pollack or the noble 

 bass fishing, which we so often read of but so seldom 

 experience. In their preference the writer joins them, 

 but half a loaf is better than no bread, and a day's sea- 

 fishing of the type described is certainly better than 

 idling ashore waiting for grand sporting experiences 

 which may never come. 



BREAM FISHING. 



THE average coarse fisherman is under the impression 

 that he thoroughly understands the art and practice of 

 bream fishing. He says, " What can I learn about 

 catching them ? Why, I've taken tons." And probably 

 he has. But that does not prove that, if placed on a 

 water swarming with these fish, he will succeed in 

 capturing one. 



The false impression of the ease with which bream 

 are to be taken has chiefly arisen from the fact that the 

 average angling author knows nothing about them, and 

 has been chiefly dependent for information on the rustic 

 night-fisher or our good old authority, Izaak Walton. 



During the nineteenth century many books have been 

 written for the better instruction of the angler, about 

 three of which fulfil their object. The others are 

 stuffed with information collected from various sources, 

 none unimpeachable, partially digested by the author, 

 and then placed before the angling public to mislead the 

 unwary and become subjects of derision to the fisher- 

 man who has dearly purchased his practical experience. 



Take, for example, the account written in Buckland's 

 " British Fishes " of fishing the Norfolk Broads : 



" The first thing the fisherman looks for is the worms ; 

 they must be worms of the largest size, not those dug 

 out of the ground ; they must be picked up off the grass 

 at night. The hole he fishes in is as deep, to use his 

 own words, as ' two pair of reins and a plough line.' 



