60 BEST'S ART OF ANGLING. 



another at the vent on the contrary side, which 

 makes it play better. 



Let no weeds hang on your bait, for if they do 

 the pike will not touch it ; and always throw it 

 into the water gently. 



When you have a bite, and the fish goes down 

 the stream, it is commonly a small one ; but on 

 the contrary, if he sails slowly upward with the 

 bait, it is a sign of a good one : great fishes in ge- 

 neral bite more calmly than small ones ; for the 

 small ones snatch and run away with the bait with- 

 out any deliberation, but old fishes are more wary. 



Be careful how you take a pike out of the wa- 

 ter, for his bite is venemous ; therefore if you have 

 not a landing-net, put your finger and thumb into 

 his eyes, and take him out that way. 



Both at trowl and snap, always have one or 

 more swivels on the line, which will prevent its 

 kenking, and make it play better in the water. 



Whenever you find your bait-fish water-sopt, 

 change it directly. The, hooks for this fish are 

 various. 



THE PERCIS. 



The perch is bow-backed like a hog, and armed 

 with . stiff gristles, and his sides with dry, thick 

 scales. He is a very bold biter, which appears by 

 his daring to venture upon one of his own kind 

 with more courage than even the ravenous luce. 

 He seldom grows above two feet long, spawns once 

 a year, either in February or March, and bites best 

 in the latter part of the spring. His haunts are 

 chiefly in streams not very deep, under hollow 

 banks, a gravelly bottom, and at the turning of an 

 eddy. If the weather is cool and cloudy, and the 



