CHAPTER VI. 



MINNOW-FISHING. 



" Beneath, a shoal of silver fishes glides 

 And plays about the gilded barges' sides ; 

 The ladies angling in the crystal lake, 

 Feast on the waters with the prey they take : 

 At once victorious with their lines and eyes, 

 They make the fishes and the men their prize." 



WALLER. Poem on St. James's Park. 



EXT to the use of the artificial fly, trol- 

 ling with the spinning Minnow is the 

 most exciting, sportsmanlike, and suc- 

 cessful method of killing trout, grayling, 

 pike, &c. Many Anglers have hitherto 

 doubted the killing of grayling with the spinning Minnow. 

 That they can be taken by this method the writer has 

 proved more than once, especially in the River Ure, near 

 Bolton Bridge, in Wensleydale, as far back as 1830. 

 While trolling for jack there, he took several grayling 

 from half-a-pound to upwards of two pounds in weight, 

 with the spinning Minnow. He has also, since that 

 time, killed them in the Swale and Skeeby Beck with 

 the same bait. The best Minnows for trolling are those 

 that have dark backs, and bellies of the brightest and 

 most silvery white. These are to be got in most trout 

 streams or brooks, and in any back-water or " dub-hole" 

 left by the floods, where you may take them with a small 



