PRACTICAL ESSAY. IO/ 



Flies of all kinds. 



Small fish for pike, minnows for trout and perch. 



Pearl barley, boiled until it is soft enough for the hook to 

 penetrate, is a capital bait for roach, as are boiled wheat and barley. 



Cheese is a good bait for chub, barbel, and carp. 



Shrimps (boiled) are good for salmon and perch. 



Paste is a very favourite bait for roach, dace, carp, and other 

 fish. It may be made in various ways. The crumb of new white 

 bread, worked up, with clean hands, into a sticky paste, is as good 

 as any. It may be coloured with vermilion, and sweetened or 

 flavoured with honey or shrimp paste, or anything the angler fancies. 

 Plain white paste made from Huntley and Palmer's biscuits is what 

 a successful angler of my acquaintance swears by. 



Artificial flies, minnows, andyfr// are afterwards referred to. 



Fish spawn of any kind is an illegal bait. 



For the purpose of attracting fish to a given spot, where the 

 angler may fish for them with greater chances of success, ground- 

 bait is used. This is thrown in the day before, if possible; for time 

 should be allowed the fish to get hungry again after partaking of 

 it, when a little thrown in occasionally, while the angler is fishing, 

 will keep them together. 



Grains, soaked bread, broken worms, greaves, anything that fish 

 will eat, may be used as ground-bait, so that it is inferior in quality 

 to the bait the angler is fishing with. 



Where there is a current the ground-bait should be kneaded 

 into balls, and thrown so that it falls to the bottom and breaks up 

 at the spot where you mean to fish. 



And now, as a prelude to the instruction afterwards conveyed, 

 let us carefully note the proceedings of a bottom-fisher at work by 

 the side of a slow-running stream, where most bottom-feeding fish 

 may be met with. 



He has not had the time or the opportunity of ground-baiting 

 the spot the day before, so he soaks a small loaf of bread in a little 

 sand-pool while he is putting his tackle together. Then, squeezing 

 a handful of it, he throws it in the river a little higher up than the 



