262 FISHING GOSSIP. 
—which in some persons means the same thing—to 
be rejected in the question. Our forefathers certainly, 
one and all, as anglers, gave fish the credit of possess- 
ing the faculty to so refined a degree that even the 
apparently infinitesimal distinction between the fat 
of the kidney of a lamb and that of a sheep is in- 
sisted upon for the proper admixture of certain 
descriptions of pastes. 
We have shown that a stale bait will be rejected 
by different descriptions of fish ; it will be as easy 
for us to get an affirmative to the assertion that 
mouldy bread or bran is equally repugnant to the 
delicate palates of trout, chub, roach, etc., either used 
as ground-bait or in the form of paste. The same 
objection to a dead or putrid worm may be noticed in 
reference to trout and perch. It may be urged that 
this aversion is arrived at by a close ocular inspec- 
tion on the fish’s part. But if such be the case, we 
should probably find fish in the morning upon the 
hooks of night-lines, whether the worms were fresh 
or otherwise, and this is not the case. Smell, in fact, 
is less fallible than sight, for there are a great many 
things that look repulsive which are good to eat, and 
there are few things, if any, that smell objectionable 
which the palate or stomach will tolerate. When 
fish take to eating stale or corrupt baits, either by 
day or night, it will be so much the worse for the 
water-rat and the moor-hen, and that immense minor 
