FISHING AT HOME AND ABROAD 



The running line must be fine, or it will neutralize the sensibility of the 

 float, and when sodden and sinking between the float and the rod, will 

 also impede the quickness of the strike. In length, thirty yards is enough 

 for most labeos, as their habit is generally to bore down to the bottom, not 

 sulking, but not travelling, though fighting doggedly as if they thought 

 they could get deeper than the bottom. He will keep at it, all honour to 

 him as a die-hard, and you should be keeping the strain upwards. Now 

 and then a really big one, or a rohu or catla, may treat you to a rush, 

 and it would be a cruel ending to be unprepared for such luck, so it is 

 well to have 150 yards, considering how light your tackle is, and if your 

 running line is fine, a winch of three and a half inches in diameter will 

 hold it. 



The places where you will fish for labeo are large, artificially excavated, 

 river -fed ponds, with stone steps for the bathers, and sometimes stone 

 faced all round, some of them squares of a quarter of a mile on each side, 

 some even more, but mostly less. They are plentiful all over India for 

 ablutions in a tropical clime, and the claims of caste. Being river fed, all 

 sorts of fish come down the feeding channel as fry, and attain size in 

 these ponds or tanks, or ghats, as they are called. There you will get 

 other fish beside labeo, such as the mirga, the olive carp, the white 

 carp, the rohu, the catla, the freshwater shark, and the chilwa, all to 

 be noticed below, and the bites of which will present no difficulties to 

 the ordinary angler. It is to the bites of the labeo, and when to strike, that 

 we must recur. 



The first indication of a fish being at your bait will be that the slanting 

 float will stand upright. Then be closely on the alert, but not premature, 

 don't strike till you see a rapid vibration, a mere tremor or quivering. 

 The float will go down and up, down and up, again and again, some ten 

 or twenty times or more, and naay be a little more each time, and slowly, 

 and so little that only by aid of the bands of red and white can you detect 

 it. When there comes a rapid, very rapid, succession of small bobs, then 

 strike instantly. There is not a moment to be lost. On one occasion I had 

 my float go down again and again till the white top end was under 

 water, but I did not strike till there was the merest tremor just visible. 

 For that I struck instantly, and got a seven-pounder. While this bite was 

 going on a friend on my right and another on my left were each playing a 

 fish, having sidled off to get away from me. 



It is well to fish side by side, say six feet apart, as so many bites are lost, 

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