194 Fisuine iv AMERICAN WATERS. 
of split bamboo rod, handled by expert anglers. The natives 
tie on their click reel; and for guides and top, use loops of 
leather or raw-hide. 
Reprenons notre Discours.—Of bait-fishing nothing seems 
more simple to the uninitiated than to be able successfully 
to angle with a worm. Mere urchins have succeeded with a 
rough stick, linen line, and clumsy hook, more clumsily tied 
on, and covered with a worm, in landing a goodly-sized fish. 
But this is a mere matter of luck, and it would be absurd to 
classify the performance among the efforts of scientific bait- 
anglers. 
Entertaining, as I really do, great respect for many bait- 
fishers of trout, I the more cheerfully present the following 
opinion from the genial angler and man of genius, Thomas 
Tod Stoddart, whose “ Companion” and“ Anglers’ Rambles 
and Songs” have afforded me so much pleasure and instruc- 
tion: 
“Tt may perhaps startle some, and those no novices in the 
art, when I declare, and offer moreover to prove, that worm- 
fishing for trout requires essentially more address and expe- 
rience, as well as better knowledge of the habits and instincts 
of the fish, than fly-fishing.” He does not refer to the prac- 
tice followed in brooks and petty streams, nor as pursued 
after heavy rains in discolored waters, and goes on to say: 
“My affirmation bears solely on its practice as carried on 
during the summer months in Seotland, when the waters are 
clear and low, the skies bright and warm. Then it is, and 
then only, that it ought to be dignified as sport; and sport 
it assuredly is, fully as exciting, perhaps more so than angling 
with the fly or minnow.” 
As T agree in the method recommended by this teacher, I 
will give its principal features, and leave with the angler to 
decide in his course of practice between us. “The rod should 
approach seventeen feet in length, but light, top pieces some- 
what stiff, of lance or hickory.” 
The common trouting-line of stained silk and hair, tapering 
