APPENDIX. 239 
mouth of the river, were prohibited from angling in the 
river, all rights being vested in the fishermen of the 
more important town of Rostock, nine miles higher up. 
In the Mediterranean, the sport, though uncertain, 
is as much bolder as is the accompanying 
scenery. Itisin fact an almost unvarying relation 
this ; the bolder the scenery, the better the sea- 
fishing. In the more southern sea, it is true, we have 
far different conditions ; the percentage of salt is much 
greater, the tides are of considerably more account, and, 
in some inshore places, the water is, if anything, over- 
fished. Yet the variety of the fish, more especially of 
breams, gurnards and wrasses, is certain to delight the 
naturalist, even if the individuals are often too small to 
give much sport. 
The fact is, the best chance of a good bag, whether of 
grey mullet in the docks, or of large bream and allied 
fishes without any English name from the open water 
outside, is at night, and to accompany a really skilful 
Italian on a night’s expedition and watch his cunning 
manipulation of groundbaits and horsehair lines and gut 
traces is an education for ahy sea-fisherman. The 
Germans, the Mecklenburgers at any rate, have but 
the crudest notions of fine tackle, and indeed as long 
as their fish remain unsophisticated and learn no 
better from intruding Englishmen, there is little need for 
them to improve their tackle or vary their methods. 
The universal worm, unscoured and half dead, impaled 
on a blunt hook will do all that is necessary. 
But with the Italians it is another matter, and there 
are few of the secrets of angling that are not, in one form 
or other, known to them. Rods and reels, fine lines of 
spun black horsehair, gut traces, swivels to lessen friction, 
different baits and groundbaits to suit certain conditions 
of wind and weather, all these find a place in the lore of 
the humblest angler on the rocky shores of the Mediter- 
ranean, and indeed most of the fraternity belong to the 
poorer class, so far at least as Italy is concerned. 
There are few of the methods alluded to in the fore- 
‘going pages that might not with more or less prospect of 
success be practised in the Mediterranean, though I 
should from experience be inclined to counsel as little 
Mediter- 
ranean 
