278 TIIE COMPLETE ANGLEIt. [PART I. 



use them, you will find them au excellent bait for bream, 

 carp, or indeed for almost any fish. 



And after this manner you may also keep gentles all 

 winter, which are a good bait then, and much the better for 

 being lively and tough. Or you may breed and keep gentles 

 thus : take a piece of beast's liver, and with a cross stick 

 hang it in some corner over a pot or barrel, half full of dry 

 clay ; and as the gentles grow big, they will fall into the 

 barrel, and scour themselves, and be always ready for use 

 whensoever you incline to fish ; and these gentles may be 

 thus created till after Michaelmas. But if you desire to 

 keep gentles to fish with all the year, then get a dead cat or 

 a kite, and let it be fly-blown ; and when the gentles begin 

 to be alive and to stir, then bury it and them in soft, moist 

 earth, but as free from frost as you can, and these you 

 may dig up at any time when you intend to use them: 

 these will last till March, and about that time turn to 

 be flies. 



But if you be nice to foul your fingers, which good anglers 

 seldom are, then take this bait : get a handful of well-made 

 malt, and put it into a dish of water, and then wash and 

 rub it betwixt your hands till you make it clean, and as free 

 from husks as you can ; then put that water from it, and 

 put a small quantity of fresh water to it, and set it in some- 

 thing that is fit for that purpose over the fire, where it is 

 not to boil apace, but leisurely and very softly, until it 

 become somewhat soft, which you may try by feeling it 

 betwixt your finger and thumb ; and when it is soft, then 

 put your water from it : then take a sharp knife, and turn- 

 ing the sprout-end of the corn upward, with the point of 

 your knife take the back part of the husk off from it, and 

 yet leaving a kind of inward husk on the corn, or else it is 

 marred ; and then cut off that sprouted end, I mean a little 

 of it, that the white may appear, and so pull off the husk on 

 the cloven side, as I directed you ; and then cutting off a 

 very little of the other end, that so your hook may enter ; 

 and, if your hook be small and good, you will find this to 

 be a very choice bait, either for winter or summer, you 

 sometimes casting a little of it into the place where your 

 float swims. 



And to take the roach and dace, a good bait is the young 



