FISHING AT HOME AND ABROAD 

 generally No. 6 Limerick No. 9 in fine water. I found a black fly best, 

 others preferred a tinsel body with junglecock wings, and legs of jungle - 

 cock hackle. Season, October to end of May, March, April and May being 

 the best months. 



The lesser barils {Barilius canarensis^ B. bakeri, B. gatensis) are numerous 

 in the rivers of Southern India, affecting the rocky parts. They run to 

 about six or seven inches, but are as quick and game as any beck trout, 

 and call for as good fishing. Any small fly will take them. Their brilliant 

 colours defy the painter. 



In the larger rivers of Southern India the carnatic carp (Barbus car- 

 naticus) deserves honourable mention, for is he not a fly taker, ordinarily 

 from one or two to seven pounds, and recorded up to twenty-five pounds ? 

 He swims in shoals, like dace, needs as quick striking as they do, 

 and makes a stern fight on a fourteen-foot or even a sixteen-foot rod. 

 Frequenting the same rivers as mahseer, he favours the quieter parts of 

 them, the eddies and slower deep waters, where he is best taken from a 

 coracle or other boat. When into one, back away into mid-stream, so as 

 to take him away from disturbing the shoal, or he will blab, and warn 

 them off. Then revisit the shoal, and take another. A black fly, or a gaudy 

 one of peacock harl and feather on a No. 6 Limerick hook with a fourteen- 

 foot rod, and flshing from a coracle, will give you ** right royal sport," 

 as a friend described it. 



In the smaller slower weedy streams of Ganara, and probably elsewhere, 

 will be found Barbus filamentosus, and two or three other very similar fish, 

 which call for fine fishing and quick striking with a small fly, and light 

 trout rod. They run between a quarter and half a pound, and are not 

 worth going far afield for, but should their stream chance to be near the 

 reader's camp or abode, he may find them test his skill, and afford 

 diversion, and be glad to be told of their existence, if he is anything like 

 a certain salmon tamer who was such an enthusiast that he declared he 

 would rather catch tadpoles than catch nothing. 



THE MARRAL 



I am no great admirer of the marral or Indian pike (Ophiocephalus 

 marulius, O. striatus, 0. leucopunctatus), considering that he shows but in- 

 different sport; still, he may not be left unmentioned, because he has 

 his votaries, and is ubiquitous, to some extent because he can travel on 

 land in heavy rain or overflow, but chiefly because natives, especially 

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