28 OLD-FASHIONED ANGLING 



that over ninety years ago, the same views were pro- 

 mulgated, relating to the profit that might be obtained 

 from fish in ponds, as have been brought forward in 

 the Times and other papers during recent years. 

 Our author says : " It is surprising that, considering 

 the benefit which may accrue from making ponds 

 and keeping of fish, it is not more generally put in 

 practice. For, besides furnishing the table and 

 raising money, the land would be vastly improved 

 and be worth forty shillings an acre ; four acres 

 converted into a pond will return every year a 

 thousand fed carp from the least size to fourteen 

 or fifteen inches long, besides pike, perch, tench, 

 and other fish. The carp alone may be reckoned 

 to bring one with another, sixpence, ninepence, or 

 perhaps twelvepence apiece, amounting at the low- 

 est rate to twenty-five pounds, and at the highest 

 to fifty, which would be a very considerable as well 

 as useful improvement." Exactly ; this has been 

 written and pointed out in the papers year after 

 year. 



There are wood-cuts of every fish and full direc- 

 tions how to angle for them. For pike, trolling, live 

 baiting, fishing with frogs, are all lengthily described ; 

 and also a curious sort of spinning, the motion being 

 caused by cutting off one of the fins close to the 

 gills and another behind the vent on the contrary 



