ffi 



or three hooks may he used, as they "bite freely, 

 and are frequently pulled out in pairs. Large perch 

 are caught with a small dace, gudgeon, or minnow, 

 used as the live-bait for pike, with the single hook 

 passed through the hack or the lips. When bot- 

 tom-fishing, have tackle strong enough to enable 

 you to pull them out at once, without giving them 

 line. Perch are commonly met with in shoals, and 

 when they begin to bite, the angler may generally 

 reckon on a large take. They appear to be a stupid 

 fish, for it certainly requires very little skill to catch 

 them. When a school-boy, we recollect catching six 

 dozen, all that were in the pool, one evening be- 

 tween six and eight o'clock, when the water was so 

 clear that we could see them hasten to seize the 

 bait directly it was thrown in, as if contending like 

 steam-boat passengers, who should be first ashore. 

 Our rod and line were anything but elegant, the 

 former being of unbarked hazel, and the latter a 

 home-made article of hair, each link twisted by 

 means of a crooked pin fixed in the crown of an 

 old hat, and joined by clumsy knots which would 

 scarcely slip through the eyes of the spectacles 

 which we are now obliged to use when we mend a 

 pen or dress a fly. 



Lo here, gentle reader, the portrait of a simple 

 youth, silly .Bobby Beaty, a quondam angling ac- 

 quaintance of our own who laboured under angli- 

 mania, and who broke the ice on Squire Salkeld's 

 pond to fish for perch at Christmas. The disease, 



