THE BARBEL. 61 



hundredweight of fish was not considered anything extraordi- 

 nary. The baits, for a barbel consist of worms, slugs, gentles, 

 grubs, scratchings, or cheese ; although odd fish are some- 

 times taken by strange baits, such as bits of pudding, pieces 

 of fat bacon, or strips of lean beef, &c., &c., while a piece of 

 a larapern is a good bait for big fish. 



In some continental waters we hear of the barbel reaching 

 the extraordinary weight of forty and fifty pounds ; but in 

 England we have nothing like that, from sixteen to eight- 

 teen pounds being the top weight for a barbel in the Trent 

 and the Thames, which two rivers, by-the-bye, are the best 

 barbel rivers in England. The biggest that I ever saw was 

 thirteen pounds in weight, but I heard of one that was taken 

 on a night-line with lampern bait which reached seventeen 

 pounds. Big fellows like these do not, however, often fall 

 to the lot of the angler, he may be well satisfied with one of 

 ten pounds and a nine or eight-pounder is not to be despised, 

 indeed I should question if any angler during the last six 

 years has taken a bag of barbel, of say, twenty fish that have 

 averaged above three pounds each fish. An angler fishing 

 Sir Henry Bromley's water at Stoke, about three years ago, 

 caught, I believe fifty barbel, and the whole lot only weighed 

 seventy-two pounds. An old angler also told me that the 

 best day's barbel fishing he ever had on the Trent was about 

 thirty years ago. He caught thirty-two fish, five of them 

 weighed from twelve to fifteen pounds each, about a dozen 

 were from six to ten pounds each, and not one of the others 

 were under three pounds —a glorious bag. He says the 

 thirty-two fish weighed 224 lbs., being an average of seven 

 pounds each fish. We must not expect anything of the sort 

 to happen to us, however, until nets are things of the past, 

 and poachers cease to exist. 



Some anglers may suppose that as the barbel is a strong 

 and powerful fish, strong and powerful tackle is required to 



