THE JACK. 205 



angel " for the day. The fun at once assumes the " fast 

 and furious " style. It is a day when the jack are " on/' 

 A 8-pounder, a 4-pounder, and other pounders yield to 

 the skill of man and their own appetites in quick succes- 

 sion, but for the first two hours an 8-pounder is the 

 biggest fish. At last, attached to " the fatal thread," is 

 one, evidently a monster, to be judged so, however, not 

 so much from his dash as from his heavy, dogged resist- 

 ance. He must be humoured, for the tackle is compara- 

 tively fine, and he bores towards the other line, and before 

 it could be got out of the way he is hopelessly entangled 

 with it, and so becomes, as it were, the captured of both 

 rods. The original one, however, of course deals with 

 him, the other angler letting go and reeling in his line as 

 circumstances required; and after about an anxious ten 

 minutes or " bad quarter of an hour," at least for him, he 

 is safe in the boat — a fine, shapely, well-conditioned fish of 

 15 lbs. ; a very rex atgue tyrannus aquarum. He is scored 

 to my rod after a slight suggestion that honours should 

 be divided; and, to the credit of both anglers let it be 

 recorded, no attempt was made to perpetuate the old joke 

 of a " union jack," which is invariably served up when a 

 fish, as is often the case, takes the baits on both lines, and 

 the verdict fairly is "half is mine and half is thine." 

 Visions at once arise of 20, 25, and 30-pounders to follow, 

 for such there are in the water, but the visions are not 

 realized ; indeed, the capture of the big fish seemed to 

 have the effect of making the tribe, for some time at least, 

 like " grey shirtings and mule twist " are sometimes 

 described in mercantile language, "'quiet/' 



But the jack market is soon buoyant again, and after 

 some " small fry," ranging between 3 lbs. and 5 lbs., had 



