136 DAYS AMONG THE PIKE AND PERCH 



but drive the hooks home my friend never could. He left 

 many a snap and trace hanging on those bushes by trying 

 to shoot the bait underneath them. One Saturday after- 

 noon my friend got him ; he tried a small dace on a well- 

 mounted paternoster, and jerked the hook well home at 

 the first grab ; that fish fought like a tiger and leaped like 

 a salmon ; but a quarter of an hour saw the end of it, 

 and one of the handsomest twelve-and-a-half-pounders 

 that he ever saw was duly bagged. He always calculated 

 that fish as at least a twenty-pounder, so was somewhat 

 disappointed that he was so far out of the reckoning. 



One of the largest pike he took from that river was 

 landed in the quickest time ; the situation was dangerous, 

 so he took the bull by the horns and stuck the gaff into 

 him at once, after hauling him quickly to the bank ; the 

 whole operation did not last four minutes, and the pike, 

 a splendid, short, and well-fed one, pulled down the beam 

 at seventeen pounds good. Another seventeen-pounder 

 was landed near the same place by a novice, the first time 

 he went, and with the first live bait he ever threaded on a 

 hook ; but I must say he would never have landed it 

 without the help of my friend, who ran up in response to 

 his cries for assistance. It is now preserved and adorns 

 that angler's sanctum ; and he can say what many of the 

 keenest and most experienced pike fishermen cannot, that 

 the first jack he ever hooked was worthy of a glass case. 



Taking things on the whole, I fancy that river from 

 Chippenham down to Bradford-on-Avon was as good as 

 anything I ever heard about or fished in ; and the same 

 could be said of the perch. In those days, when they were 

 on the feed, perch after perch have come on both float 

 tackle and paternoster, from one pound to two and a half 

 pounds each, and once my old friend topped the basket 

 with a three-and-a-half-pounder. Even a boy that came 

 down one day with the roughest of tackle, and worms 

 freshly dug from the garden, got a lovely dish of perch 

 that would have satisfied the most exacting of anglers. 



