Bolam: The Natural History of Hornsea Mere. 39 
end, from Holmes’s boat-house, several years ago, and weighed 
271 lb., measuring 3 feet 8} inches in length. 
During July of the present year I was in the boat with 
Taylor two or three times when a pike was wanted, and we 
had little difficulty in catching them, three or four each time, 
running from about three to eight pounds. The smaller ones 
were returned to the water. On Ist July, in the stomach of 
one of about five pounds, were two eels, one fifteen inches long, 
the other about a foot. Taylor has frequently seen eels in 
those caught before, but has never found any remains of birds 
in any pike he has opened. Last season, I was informed that 
pike were so scarce that actually none was caught ! 
Roach of upwards of a pound in weight seem to be common 
here. Holmes has a photograph of quite a number considerably 
exceeding that weight killed by one of his boats in one day’s 
sport a year or two ago. I saw several dead ones about the 
sides of the Mere from time to time, well up to a foot long, 
the largest being 144 inches, and occasional shoals of fish some 
of which were quite as large. Holmes’s record Roach, during 
the twenty-six years he has been here, was killed this spring, 
and weighed 2 lb. 134 ounces. 
Perch of a pound weight are also frequent. I saw some 
large ones in the water, and five caught by the children from 
Wassand, a day or two before I left, averaged more than a 
pound, the two largest being well over two pounds apiece. 
Of Eels I used to see many, and large ones, about the fringes 
of the reeds. Of one of them I had a leisurely view, under a 
foot or two of water, at the Wassand end of the Mere, on 
11th July, and it was one of the largest eels I ever saw. It was 
lying half buried in the mud, and I rowed back to the boat- 
house for a gaff in order to try and catch it, but the gaff was 
very blunt, and it made off on my striking at it. In the 
thickest part it was quite as thick as the oars I was using at 
the time, and must have weighed some half-dozen pounds, I 
estimated, perhaps even more. 
Among insects, Midges are a feature of the place, and a 
sight worth beholding at Wassand. On a calm evening they 
come out in swarms, and fly over the tops of the trees in dense 
smoke-like columns which can be seen, with ease, across the 
width of the Mere. On the Hornsea road the crowds dancing 
under the lea of the hedges are often so vast that they make 
quite a haze on the landscape, often bearing a curious re- 
semblance to clouds of dust raised by passing motor-cars at 
a short distance. 
Mosquitoes—of at least two species—are a bane to anyone 
working about the damp woods. They are rather aptly called 
“ gimlet-noses’ by the natives, and almost every day my legs 
were more or less—generally more !—bitten through my thick 
1913 Jan. 1 
