48 PIKE AND OTHER COARSE FISH. 



It will often be found of assistance to expend a few handsful 

 of ground-bait in attracting fish to the spot which the caster 

 can most conveniently cover with the sweep of his net. I have 

 also heard of glass bottles filled with fresh roses being used for 

 the same purpose, though I do not vouch for the success 

 of this novel sort of horticultural show. In the casting for 

 Gudgeon ' raking ' the bottom is often a good expedient. 



The modern casting-net was, there is good reason to believe, 

 similar to or identical with the amphiblestron, or casting-net of 

 the ancients. A fisherman with net in hand and just about to 

 make his cast was one of the figures on the shield of Hercules, 

 whose attitude was thus described : 'And on the land there 

 stood a fisherman on the look out, and he held in his hands a 

 casting-net for fish, being like to a man about to hurl it from 

 him.' Or as it has been versified 



On the crag a fisher sat 

 Observant ; in his grasp he held a net, 

 Like one that poising rises to the throw. 



The Latin names for the casting-net were jacnlnm and 

 fi/nda, each of which terms etymologically explains its use ; thus 

 Ovid writes, 



Hi jaculo pisces, illi capiuntur ab hamis, 

 and Virgil uses the latter name 



Atque alius latum funda jam verberat amncm. 



The Greek term to denote the cast was /3oA.os, from fldXXu, 

 'to throw.' The Romans used their casting-net, it is probable, 

 in a manner not dissimilar to the Greeks ; and they had the same 

 term to signify 'the cast,' bolus. There is a very amusing pas- 

 sage in Plautus, where Dinarchus compares the dangers of iove 

 and its allurements to fish caught in a casting-net : 



Quasi in piscinam rete qui jaculum parat : 

 Quando abiit rete pessum, turn adducit sinum. 

 Sin jecit rete, piscis ne effugiat, cavet : 

 Dum hue dum illuc reti eos impedit 

 Pisces, usque adeo donicum eduxit foras. 

 Itidem est amator. (True, act i. sc. i.) 



