i$ PIKE AND OTHER COARSE FISH. 



reels referred to in the first volume as suitable for salmon-fishing 

 would, in smaller sizes, be also suited to spinning, if it were not 

 for the question of weight. In spinning, a reel that will carry 

 sixty or eighty yards of jack-line is practically all that is 

 required, and such an endless assortment of these can now be 

 obtained at the tackle shops that the only difficulty lies in 

 making a selection. For the reasons elsewhere mentioned I 

 should recommend a check winch with narrow grooves and 

 deep side plates one of the greatest improvements which has 

 been introduced into reels in modern times and a check 

 which should be rather 'weaker than stronger,' to paraphrase 

 the Admiralty instructions to their recruiting officers, ' to prefer 

 recruits having hands rather larger than smaller.' The advantages 

 gained by this sort of reel over the old-fashioned shallow-plate 

 broad-grooved winch are increased speed inasmuch as the 

 diameter of the axle upon which the line is wound is enlarged 

 and increased power, because the handle by which it is worked 

 being further from the axis proportionably greater leverage is 

 obtained. 



The handles of all reels should either be directly attached 

 to the side plate or so adjusted as to amount to the same thing. 

 The only drawback to the solid side plate is the additional 

 weight it gives the reel, but the advantages of the handle 

 thus attached are so numerous as to make other considerations 

 of comparatively little importance. Amongst these advantages 

 are the obviating of the constant entanglement of the line 

 round the old-fashioned detached projecting handle or rather 

 more correctly speaking, the crank to which the handle is 

 attached and the greatly increased strength, and improbability 

 of being broken or bent by the many little accidents that 

 take place during the actual business of fishing. 



Of the solid reels suitable for spinning and what I here 

 say of reels for spinning applies equally to reels for every 

 description of pike-fishing Mr. Chas. Farlow's ' patent lever 

 <vinch,' or perhaps, where fish run unusually large, Malloch's 

 'Sun and Planet,' described in Vol. I., will be found the best, 



