56 AMATEUR FISHING. 



Mr. Bertram tells us, and tells us truly, that hungry 

 cod-fish will seize any kind of bait ; and for the long or 

 great lines we have been describing, you may use bits of 

 whiting, herring, haddock, and of almost every fish which 

 swims in the sea. For hand-lines, however, the best bait 

 is mussels or white whelks, and the next best lug-worms. 

 If the reader should spend a few weeks in the later 

 autumn at any of the coast-towns of Fife or Haddington- 

 shire, he cannot do better than arrange for a brief expe- 

 rience of " deep-sea fishing." He need not venture further 

 out than the Isle of May, in the Firth of Forth, or 

 the Bell Rock. Bait will be provided by the fishermen ; 

 or, if he takes his spade or three-pronged fork, he can dig 

 up a supply of lug- worms on the sands. The lug is about 

 five inches long and half an inch thick. The only part 

 used as bait is the head part. Mussels or white whelks 

 are caught by a line ornamented with a number of pieces 

 of carrion or cod-heads, and laid along the bottom in a 

 locality where they are known to be plentiful. The 

 whelks fasten upon the cod-heads, are pulled up, stowed 

 away in bags, and preserved in the well of the boat until 

 wanted. 



The English fishers largely employ the trawl-net in 

 their white-fish fisheries, though the practice is sometimes 

 described as injurious to the fishing-grounds. 



The trawl-net is worked from a boat called a trawler; 

 generally a vessel of about thirty-five to fifty tons, manned 

 by a crew of five or six men and two or three boys, who 

 frequently share both the risk and the profit on the co- 

 operative principle. Each yawl is furnished with two 

 masts, and three sets of sails to suit various states of 



