FISHING REELS. 91 



modern inventions. Any reel can be made to fit it in a few 

 moments. If it is too shallow for the cross-bar of a reel, 

 it is only necessary to deepen it with a gouge chisel or a 

 penknife. If the reel fits too loosely, a piece of paper or 

 cardboard, placed under the cross-bar, tightens it. With 

 solid metal reel-seats there is no remedy but by altering 

 the cross-bar of the reel, which sometimes entails a good 

 deal of labor and no little skill ; and it may have to be al- 

 tered a second or a third time to fit the metal reel-seats 

 of other rods. 



The solid metal reel-seat subserves no important purpose, 

 and adds one or two ounces to the weight of the rod. It 

 is idle to say that the additional weight gives the rod a 

 better balance it should balance without it; or that the 

 wood may swell (without it) and cause the reel to stick 

 if the groove is well varnished and the rod properly used 

 it will not swell. The fact is, the metal reel- seat is put on 

 to make the rod " sell." If rod makers will not conform 

 to the standard size of reel-seats, as now adopted, then let 

 them go back to the old grooved, wooden reel-seat. 



CLICK REELS. 



Among the improved click reels is one patented by Mr. 

 Thomas H. Chubb, which, in addition to having an improved 

 and reliable " click," is of a new and novel form. The end 

 plates, instead of being the usual flat disks, are struck up 

 so as to be convex on the outside, with aflat and narrow rim, 

 or edge. The inner side, or concavity of the end plates, 

 being opposed to the concavity of the spool plates, allows 

 an elliptical space between them, in which the spring and 

 pawl of the click are arranged in an improved manner, and 



