50 ANGLER'S EQUIPMENT. 



off and merely graze the mouth of the fish. As a 

 proof of this, if the angler is using hooks which 

 are not sufficiently tempered, he will frequently, 

 after having fished for some time, find them bent 

 out in the point, showing that the pull was so 

 much off the straight line, that the force which 

 was sufficient to bend the wire, was not enough 

 to fix the hook. Whenever this is observed, the 

 angler should restore the hook to its original 

 shape by biting it between his teeth, as it will 

 never catch a fish in that state. The point of 

 the hook must not lie in exactly the same line as 

 B A, because if it does, when it comes in contact 

 with the mouth of a fish it will hardly take any 

 hold at all ; it must be so much off the line B A, 

 that when it comes against anything it will press 

 into it. In order to understand what we mean, 

 the reader should take two dressed hooks of the 

 same shapes as Nos. i and 2, and pull them 

 against some soft substance, when he will at 

 once see the force of these remarks. 



We believe that with a fly dressed upon a hook 

 of No. i bend, we could catch at least three trout 

 for two we could catch with a fly dressed on a 

 hook bent as No. 2, out of an equal number of 

 rises. There are numbers of anglers who are of 

 the same opinion, and would not use a Limerick 

 hook on any account ; and we have met with pro- 

 fessional anglers, ready enough in general to accept 

 of any kind of tackle, who absolutely refused to 



