210 NOTES ON FISH AND FISHING. 



besides the orthodox trimmers — also called " man-of-war " 

 trimmers — red one side and white the other. It is, I 

 suppose, from the fact of their changing sides and colour 

 when a fish takes the bait, and thus accommodating them- 

 selves to circumstances, that they are called " trimmers." 

 The boat was rowed to the windward shore of the lake, 

 as trimmers travel, though slowly, in the direction of the 

 wind ; and then commenced the baiting of the hooks and 

 the planting of the "engines" at intervals all along the 

 shore some ten yards or so from the land. There were the 

 " tell-tale " trimmers already mentioned ; trimmers in the 

 shape of claret-bottles for floats (not any kind of bottle, 

 but claret-bottles, for these will float longitudinally when 

 properly " trimmed " with water, and the spare line of the 

 trimmer wound round their necks will unreel when a jack 

 runs the bait) ; and trimmers with bullocks' bladders. A 

 few " bank -runners/'' which are a kind of trimmer, espe- 

 cially when a leger lead and cork beyond it are used, 

 making the fishing a cross between night-lining and ordi- 

 nary gorge live-baiting, were also set. So, too, were a few 

 bough trimmers — that is, trimmers in shape of letter T 

 without any horizontal finishing lines. These are simple 

 but clever contrivances. The letter T is formed by any 

 ordinary bit of wood, which is bifurcated. Round the 

 bifurcated part the line is wound, and " nicked " in a slit 

 in one of the arms. The stem of the T is tied by a 

 separate piece of string to a bough overhanging the water, 

 and when a jack runs the bait, the line slips out of the 

 split arm and runs off the bifurcation quickly enough not 

 to check the fish. This is a very killing method of trim- 

 mering, and seems to have been known to Isaac Walton. 

 Beyond this we did not experiment, nor did we care to 



