FISHING ANECDOTES. 199 



and probably their brains knocked out, by coming in 

 contact with the beams that supported the bridge. 

 I know I used to think it a most dangerous mode 

 of travelling, and so I suppose it was. On one 

 side of this large arch there was a smaller one, with 

 huge pine posts, I may say trees, driven in against 

 a wall, for boats to pull themselves up by to the lake, 

 or I may say the beginning of the lake, and where 

 it was comparatively smooth water. Just where the 

 posts ended, and where the water began to be pretty 

 still, there were generally some of these large trout 

 lying ; and as it used to be a favourite resort of 

 numberless bleak it was what is termed good feed- 

 ing ground, and I have seen many a time a shower 

 of bleak, I may say a hundred at a time, spring 

 into the air a foot high, looking like a shower of 

 silver teaspoons, at the approach or rush of one of 

 these big trout on feed. 



Having taken good notice how the trout proceeded, 

 I made up my mind how I would proceed, which 

 was this : having put a large and well-baited bleak 

 upon my hooks, and having ascertained that he would 

 spin in real Thames fashion, I sat quietly in my 

 boat till I saw a trout on feed, and my little silvery 

 friends fly out of the water. I then cast beyond 



