64 BAITING WITH LIVING SAND-EELS. 



water longer than necessary, or expose the Sand-Eels to the 

 sun, or you will soon lose all your bait ; with ordinary care 

 they will live nearly a week. To bait with a Sand-Eel, hold 

 it between the fingers and thumb of your left hand, throat 

 outwards, put the point of the hook into the mouth, and out of 

 the gills, then turn the hook over and pass it through the throat 

 below the gills, just sufficiently to hold the hook, and throw the 

 bait overboard. A straight hook is alone fit to use, the Kirby 



FIG. 16. Living Sand-Eel bait in tide-way. 



bend twisting the head on one side. Fig. 16 shows how to 

 bait ' in a tide-way,' and is also used for whiffing. The boat 

 being moored and the line paid out the required length as 

 previously directed (p. 62), drop the lead you have in your 

 hand in front of one of the thowl-pins of your boat, and when 

 a fish takes the bait your attention will be called to it by the 

 lead rattling over the gunwale, if you are engaged at the other 

 side of the boat, which arrangement will be found preferable to 

 short rods or outriggers. Make fast the reel by passing it once 

 or twice round the thwart of the boat, leaving a couple of 



FIG. 17. Living Sand-Eel baited for slack tide. (Recommended by the 

 late P. le Noury, of Guernsey. ) 



fathoms or so of slack between it and the lead, that a heavy 

 fish may not bring himself up short and part the line, ere you 

 can attend his summons. Bore a hole in the smaller end of 

 all your thowl-pins, and if the tide or swell of the sea drags the 

 lead overboard, attach one or two to the line close to the lead ; 

 this is called a tell-tale, and one should also be fastened to the 

 light stern line. 



The second method here shown (fig. 17) is followed when 



