PRACTICAL ESSAY. 22; 



net, or the sudden disturbance of his approaching enemy, he strikes 

 to his harbour, and there keeps his garrison. The weeds which he 

 most delights in are flags and bullrushes, candocks, reeds, green 

 fog, and a weed with a small leaf, which he often frequents, espe- 

 cially about October, when they begin to rot. If a place is very 

 thick and weedy, you can easily guess exactly where his lodgings 

 are ; but if the river is free from weeds, only here or there a bank 

 or bed of bullrushes, you may safely conclude those are his retire- 

 ments and baiting-places. If the river is broad, deep, and straight, 

 like a scour, it will be the more difficult to find his recess ; and if 

 there are but few fish, it will be next to seeking a needle in a bottle 

 of hay ; for in such false rivers you may troll perhaps from morn- 

 ing till night, and scarcely get a run. But if such a place be little 

 beaten, and have plenty of fish, you may have sport enough : then 

 you must arm yourself with patience, and fish it very true and slow. 

 There is not much variety and delight in trolling such a river, be- 

 cause it is all along even and alike, and you cannot conceive where 

 your prey lies : this you may call haphazard, and expect a run 

 every throw, though you go three or four hours, and neither see 

 nor feel any fish but your own bait. 



" The best and securest way of fishing these wide reaches is by 

 drawing the bait along the sides next to you, unless you can search 

 the breadth of it, and throw over to the farther side ; but that is 

 but dull and slow sport : it will take much time to troll the length 

 of a furlong. If your river consists of pits, which is the quickest 

 and most delightful way of trolling, you must have a special regard 

 to the top and bottom of the pit. A pike may be taken sometimes 

 in the middle, but his chief seat and habitation is at the bottom of 

 the pit ; and this I have often observed, that where one pike has 

 been taken at the mouth, another has been found at the foot or 

 bottom of the pit. 



"These are the ordinary places; yet, according to the variety of 

 weather and seasons of the year, a pike will alter and change his 

 dwelling. In the winter he usually couches very nigh the ground, 

 and gets into the deepest and obscurest places. About the latter 



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