PRACTICAL LESSONS IN THE GENTLE CRAFT. 505 



No more cautious, timid fish swims than your chub, and 

 I have frequently seen a shoal of them lying near the top 

 of the water, sink slowly down and out of sight, the only 

 thing that I could discover as likely to alarm them being a 

 crow or two winging their way across the stream. Hence 

 the chub-fisher cannot be too cautious and subtle in his 

 operations. 



Chub in the summer resort to the deeps, and large still 

 pools overhung by foliage ; here they lie, day after day, if 

 undisturbed, watching for grubs and insects dropping from 

 the sheltering trees ; and at such places the dibber, with 

 his humble bee in the day-time, or large moth in the 

 evening, kills his fish. In the winter they seek places 

 where high marly banks form the sides of the stream, or 

 deep holes, with a sandy or clayey bottom, afford them 

 good harbourage ; and in nooks where this fish are known 

 to resort, they are found at the proper season, year after 

 year. Hence the say ing among anglers, "once a chub hole, 

 always a chub hole." They are a restless fish, however, 

 and shift about in the autumn and winter months, when 

 insect diet has failed them, continually seeking fresh ground. 

 It is advisable, therefore, never to stay long in one spot 

 ten minutes or a quarter of an hour is enough for if there 

 are fish there and they mean feeding, they will do so at 

 once, or not at all. 



For legering for this, and indeed for all other fish, a rod 

 of 12 ft. in length is fully long enough. I don't believe in 

 long rods for general use, and feel assured that if an 

 angler, with a short one, pits his own brains and resources 

 against the craft of the fish he is trying for, he will in the 

 long run succeed. Long rods are cumbersome and tedious 

 to the wielder, and it is only in roach fishing from the bank 

 in a. river like the Lea, for instance, where they are practi- 



