COARSE-FISHING MEMORIES 



Nearly all my pike-fishing for a number of years has been 

 done with a dead bait either spun or trolled, and I do not think 

 I have enjoyed myself the less. One great advantage has been 

 mine anyhow, and that is freedom from a bait-can. The bait- 

 can is a positive curse. If you walk with it, it splashes you all 

 over and makes you ache with its weight. If you do not walk, 

 because of the bother of lugging it along, you find that the 

 portion of river where you are is absolutely innocent of pike. 

 If you rest the can on the bank, the baits die. If you place it 

 in the river it vanishes, because you have forgetten to tie a 

 cord to its handle. Altogether it is calculated to ruin your 

 pleasure unless you are a very long-suffering man. 



Of course all fishing has its little worries, and coarse-fishing, 

 being the varied pastime it is, is full of them. But it is corre- 

 spondingly full of interests and pleasures, and I can never be 

 grateful enough to the benign providence which made me an 

 angler who can find enjoyment wherever fishes are. A love 

 of coarse-fishing has not made me the less eager in pursuit of 

 salmon and trout ; rather the more. Accustomed to find 

 variety in the sport afforded by the slow rivers of the south, 

 I find the still greater contrast afforded by the game fish and 

 their haunts an additional spice to life. All, as Walton would 

 have said, is " excellent good." And the more one can get of 

 every kind the better. 



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