92 A BOOK ON ANGLING 



nerves, as recommended by old authors if he does, he de- 

 serves to get into difficulties but he waits until he thinks the 

 fish has gorged the bait, keeping the line all clear for a run 

 in case the fish moves. In about five minutes, if he does not 

 move, he will have pouched or gorged, when the angler can 

 gather in all the loose line and give him a persuasive tug. 

 As he will probably be tugging at the poor wretch's vitals he 

 need not pull very hard. If the fish moves soon, the angler 

 must use his own discretion as to whether it may be worth 

 while waiting to see if he will seek another hold or whether 

 he has bolted the bait at short notice. Savants telegraph 

 clerks probably pretend that they can tell by certain tremb- 

 lings of the line whether a fish has pouched or not ; I am not so 

 well up in piscatorial electricity as to be able to do so. As a 

 general rule, a pike moves as soon as he has pouched ; when 

 he does, stick the hooks into him at once. If by chance he 

 does not, but appears desirous of making a time bargain of it, 

 the angler must, as I have said, use his own discretion as to 

 the time when he shall think it desirable to foreclose the 

 mortgage which Mr. Pike has taken of him. If the fish be a 

 large one, perhaps half the above time, or three minutes, will 

 be enough for him ; if a small one, the shorter time the better, 

 because he may get off without being killed, which the gorge 

 bait necessitates to every fish indiscriminately. As I have 

 said, it is not a nice way of fishing ; the fish is very apt to 

 reject the bait on feeling the lead within it, or from not being 

 very hungry, and the waiting is tedious, and the whole affair 

 is so unsatisfactory and savage that let those follow it who 

 list, for I'll none of it. Nobbes, who is called " the father of 

 trolling," gives very special and particular directions with 

 respect to it. To those who desire to know more of it, I say, 

 read Nobbes. 



Live baiting is the next method for discussion, and the only 

 way in which this should be pursued is by means of the live 

 snap. Gorge baits of all kinds, which were invented by the 

 father of cruelty, should not be permitted on any excuse where 

 pike are preserved, because no matter what the size of the fish 

 may be, they kill him. The live snap is usually composed of a 

 triangle, of which one hook is small and two are large. The 

 small one is whipped on high up at the top of the shanks of the 

 two larger ones, and it is on this small one the fish is fixed by 

 the back fin, the two large ones hanging down the side. A 

 better plan by far is to use a largish triangle, a single hook 



