202 FISHKS AND FISHING. 



winch,* line, and flies for the purpose, and went out 

 with him several times to the "Wandle, and by degrees, 

 learned to throw a line sufficiently well to take 

 some trout ; I then went up the Thames to my well- 

 known locality. Many a poor little dace did I as- 

 tonish, by sending him over my head as many yards 

 behind me, as he had been, a minute previously, before 

 me ; and frequently a large fish had the advantage of 

 carrying off my fly, with the gut attached, through 

 my striking too forcibly. In trying to get out a long 

 line, I was often annoyed by hearing a crack behind 

 me, something like a coachman's whip, denoting 

 that my fly was gone upon a voyage in the air, of 

 which I had lost all control ; and as I was totally 

 ignorant of fly-making, I became a very good cus- 

 tomer to the fly -dresser. With all these disadvan- 

 tages, I succeeded in taking some large chub ; and 

 oue evening, upon a shallow, then existing near 



* Never use a multiplying winch ; it has no power to con- 

 trol a large fish. By long experience I have found that a well- 

 made plain check winch is much superior. I have one, the 

 interior of which was taken out by a clock-Tnaker, and replaced 

 by a well-hammered wheel and check, so regulated, under my 

 direction, as to require four ounces to cause the handle to move ; 

 therefore I never fish with the hand upon my line. In strik- 

 ing, the resistance is quite sufficient to fix the hook in a fish, 

 but not suflicient to break the tackle ; if you hook a small fish, 

 he is not liable to be pulled out of the water ; and if a large 

 one. the line runs out under the slight resistance ofifered by a 

 retaining power of four ounces. 



