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The most important essential in a minnow-fisher's outfit 

 are his minnows. Artificial minnows of a dozen different 

 kinds will kill, and some of them notably the " Devon " 

 and the blue " Phantom " will sometimes kill very well, 

 but the natural fish is always to be preferred before the 

 finest imitation, or spinner, ever yet invented ; and the 

 fresher the minnow the better : that is, he should, if possible 

 (and there is no difficulty about it), be alive and having all 

 his silvery sheen about him when you put him on the 

 hooks. Kill him by a fillip on the head before you impale 

 him, though observant fishermen are agreed that it is 

 doubtful whether fish have more than the dullest sensibility 

 to pain. It is within the experience of many anglers 

 the writer amongst them to have hooked fish which have 

 broken away with hooks and tackle, and to have caught 

 them immediately afterwards with the purloined property 

 in their possession. 



There are various ways adopted by different fishermen for 

 keeping minnows alive,or at least fresh,at the river side: you 

 may preserve them in salt, which is never very satisfactory, 

 because they lose colour and become soft : if you are obliged 

 to preserve them, do so in spirits of wine. They w T ill, 

 however, keep alive for the best part of a day in an ordinary 

 soda-water bottle, with a hole through the cork, if the angler 

 keeps moving and so sufficiently aerates the water. The best 

 plan indeed, the only thoroughly satisfactory and com- 

 fortable way is to put your live minnows in damp moss, 

 which should not be wet, only fairly damp, and enclose them 

 in an ordinary May-fly box. With a few dampings in the 

 course of a day they will keep alive and retain their sheen 

 excellently, if you are careful not to let a hot sun fall upon 

 your box for more than a minute or so at a time. The 

 modes of baiting a minnow and the varieties of flights used 

 are very great, but all of them are similar in principle, the 



