68 PIKE AND OTHER COARSE FISH. 



than over the mark, as will be discovered by anyone who takes 

 the trouble of keeping a register of his sport. 



' This undesirable result is mainly attributable to the large 

 number of hooks and triangles — the latter varying from three 

 to five — commonly employed on a good-sized flight. These, I 

 unhesitatingly assert, are not only useless, but distinctly mis- 

 chievous, both as regards the spinning of the bait and the 

 basketing of the fish when hooked. Upon the bait they act 

 by impairing its brilliancy and attractiveness, rendering it flabby 

 and inelastic ; and when a transposition of the hooks becomes 

 necessary, by generally destroying it altogether. Upon the 

 pike they operate only as fulcrums by which he is enabled to 

 work out the hold of such hooks as were already fast. 



' The great size and thickness also of the hooks used con- 

 tribute materially to the losses complained of, as it should 

 always be recollected that to strike a No. i hook fairly into a 

 fish's mouth requires at least three times the force that is 

 required to strike in a No. 5 ; and that this is still more em- 

 phatically the case when the hooks are whipped in triangles. 

 For example : — let us suppose that a jack has taken a spinning- 

 bait dressed with a flight of three or four of these large triangles, 

 and a sprinkling of single hooks — say twelve in alL The bait 

 lies between his jaws grasped crosswise. Now it is probable 

 that the points of at least six of these hooks will be pressed by 

 the fish's mouth, whilst the bait also, to which they are firmly 

 attached, is held fast between his teeth. It follows, therefore, 

 that the whole of this combined resistance rriust be overcome, 

 and that at one stroke, and sharply — before a single point can 

 be buried above the barb ! 



' The grand principle in the construction of all spinning- 

 tackle is the use of the flying triangle as distinguished from 

 that whipped upon the central link. A flight constructed with 

 flying triangles can never fail to be tolerably certain in at least 

 landing a fish once struck. There are, however, many degrees 

 of excellence in such flights, even in the item of 'landing,' and 

 as regards the ' spinning ' of the bait, not one in a hundred of 



