FISHING HODS. 105 



horse hair, as silk, or a mixture of it, rots readily when 

 wet. Even hair lines are not long in rotting if care- 

 lessly left wet on the wheel. If drawn off and hung up 

 whenever they are wet, until dry, they will last very 

 long, except the short piece of the end used in cast- 

 ing, which should be renewed frequently. I had a 

 good wheel line, of my own making, that lasted me 

 twenty -five years, fishing occasionally, both for sal- 

 mon and trout, besides lending it often ; but I never 

 suffered it to lie wet on the wheel. 



A salmon wheel line for the Tweed here, at 

 St Boswells, should not be shorter than at least 

 seventy-two yards ; and all below Mertoun water 

 about a hundred. 



ON FISHING KODS. 



[Very few anglers now-a-days think of making their fishing rods, 

 and very few of those who do make them can produce rods to fish so 

 well as those produced by regular makers. A good maker can adjust 

 the spring and balance of rods to suit any angler. The woods now 

 used by the best makers are : ash, sapling, or hickory for butt, and 

 greenheart for middle and top, with sometimes a few inches of whale- 

 bone at the point. The best point we ever used was made of a bit of 

 old brier, twelve inches in length, whittled into a taper and adjusted 

 by James Baillie." EDB,.] 



To produce the best fishing-rod for use and dura- 

 bility, take a billet of good hard red hickory, well 

 seasoned (as it generally is before it reaches us here), 

 of about three or four feet long, and have it ripped 



