4 o 4 THE KEEPER'S BOOK 



and the right bait, but, without some acquaintance, on 

 your own part or your gillie's, of local conditions, such 

 success as you may have will be a mere matter of luck, 

 and there are places, indeed, where, without the exact 

 bearings of the fishing-grounds, you might as well hang 

 your baits from the cross of St. Paul's Cathedral, for 

 all the fish you are likely to catch. There are, it will 

 be realised, two kinds of local knowledge : the broader 

 knowledge of what fish are taken in the neighbourhood 

 and what bait they like best ; and the more specific, 

 equally necessary, acquaintance with the marks or bear- 

 ings of the different fishing-grounds. These have to 

 be taken with reference to sundry conspicuous objects 

 on land : a tree on a hilltop, a chine, a coastguard 

 station, a church steeple are all favourite objects because 

 sufficiently permanent to serve. They have come into 

 use by oral tradition. In prehistoric times some old 

 fisherman of the place anchored by chance on a spot 

 where he had a great catch of pollack or whiting, and 

 he immediately took his bearings so that he could come 

 again next day. In course of time he would make his 

 son free of the secret, or it would leak out somehow. 

 New grounds are continually being discovered, and 

 the greatest pains taken to keep the knowledge. I 

 have been fishing on such a mark, which may be known 

 only to my own fisherman, and as soon as another boat 

 came in sight, already perhaps a mile away, my man 

 would quietly get up the anchor and let the boat drift 

 about anyhow, while we pretended to be having all the 



