JACK TAUGHT BY EXPERIENCE. 187 



scales. Fish thus marked may not unfrequently be seen 

 in the stream. The jack, from its shape, is specially liable 

 to capture in this manner ; long and well balanced, the 

 wire has every chance of holding it. This poaching is 

 always going on ; the implement is so easily obtained 

 and concealed. The wire can be carried in the pocket, 

 and the stick may be cut from an adjacent copse. 



The poachers observe that after a fish has once escaped 

 from an attempt of the kind it is ever after far more 

 difficult of capture. The first time the jack was still and 

 took no notice of the insidious approach of the wire glid- 

 ing along towards it ; but the next — unless a long interval 

 elapses before a second trial — the moment it comes near 

 he is away. At each succeeding attempt, whether hurt or 

 not, he grows more and more suspicious, till at last to 

 merely stand still or stop while walking on the bank is 

 sufficient for him ; he is off with a swish of the tail to the 

 deeper water, leaving behind him a cloud, so to say, of 

 mud swept up from the bottom to conceal the direction of 

 his flight. For it would almost seem as if the jack throws 

 up this mud on purpose ; if much disturbed he will quite 

 discolour the brook. The wire does a good deal to 

 depopulate the stream, and is altogether a deadly imple- 

 ment. 



But a clever fish-poacher can land a jack even with- 

 out a wire, and with no better instrument than a willow 

 stick cut from the nearest osier-bed. The willow, or 



