THE ROACH. 91 



float indicating when you have a bite. I have taken good 

 roach by this plan when the stream has worked the float to 

 within a foot of the bank. Various plans are adopted for 

 making pastes, but as good a paste as you can have is made 

 of a bit of white bread crumb, the bread being dipped in 

 water and squeezed until all the water is expressed, it is then 

 worked up with the fingers to the proper consistency. This 

 makes a capital paste for this " pegging " business. Some 

 anglers say this paste is improved by adding a little honey 

 and gin to it, but I have never found that to be any better 

 than the plain paste. Coloured pastes are sometimes used 

 with advantage, they are made exactly the same as the plain 

 bread paste mentioned above, excepting the colouring. To 

 colour a paste red I roll the paste about a lump of red lead, 

 and work it well, until it assumes a nice pink colour. Don't 

 get any more of the lead, however, among the paste than you 

 can help. Another coloured paste I use is made by adding 

 a little chrome yellow to the bread paste. Some good roach 

 have been taken by these coloured pastes, but I don't per- 

 sonally think they are an improvement, on the whole, on the 

 plain paste ; when I fish with paste, it is very seldom I use 

 anything but the plain. Nevertheless, I know a very good 

 roach fisher who uses these plain coloured pastes, if I may 

 be allowed the term, and he certainly does make some good 

 catches at times. The angler can, however, please himself, 

 but whether he uses the plain or the coloured, when he makes 

 it his hands must be perfectly clean, and it would be an 

 advantage when the angler goes for a long day's paste fishing 

 and the weather is warm, to take a bit of bread with him, so 

 that he can make another lump of paste by the river side if 

 necessary, as the one he mixed before he started would have 

 a tendency to turn sour after a few hours. These pastes 

 should be rolled up in a bit of damp white rag, and I suppose 

 I need not tell you this ought to be clean. I might just say 



