SQ BOTTOM FISHING IN THE NOTTINGHAM STYLE. 



the wire ; as they say " you can thread a gentle on them so 

 much nicer," but I don't care for them, because if your hook 

 is very short in the shank you cannot hook your fish properly 

 (they do not strike sufficiently true on the point of the 

 hook). Tie two hooks on two pieces of gut, the one with a 

 short shank, and the other with a shank a little longer, and fix 

 the points in something, and then pull the gut gently, and you 

 will see then what angles the hooks and gut form. The one 

 with a short shank will approach a right angle, a great deal 

 nearer than the one with the longer one; so you will see by this 

 that when you strike a roach with the short shanked hook, you 

 will most probably draw the hook out of his mouth instead of 

 his jaw ; or, in other words, when you struck the fish, the hook 

 failed to penetrate the jaw, because the angle formed by the point 

 of the hook on the gut and shank was too great ; whereas a 

 longer shanked hook would have pulled straighter from the 

 point. Hooks that are extra fine in the wire, too, have their 

 objections. They will spring open when you strike a fish 

 with them. A fish with a hard leathery mouth takes a hook 

 of this fine wire, and instead of it at once penetrating the 

 jaw it springs open and the barb is not buried, and the re- 

 sult is the loss of the fish. I like a hook of a medium length 

 in the shank, and moderately stout in the wire, and if you 

 take notice of your hooks you will see that the points 

 of some point outwards from the shank, while others point 

 inwards. I like those pointing inwards, for I have fancied 

 that I have hooked my fish better with them. When the 

 point stands very much outwards, the hook is liable to cut 

 itself out ; but when they stand inwards they are more liable 

 to take, as it were, a fresh grip the further they go in. These 

 hooks should be very neatly and closely whipped to the gut, 

 and the best sizes you can use will be No. 8 for the tail end 

 of lob- worms ; No. 9 for cockspurs, paste, creed wheat, or 

 malt ; Nos. 10, 11, and 12 for gentles, according to the biting 



