THE PKRCH. 23 L 



working the float round from time to time into a slight 

 bay. Here the perch showed the same gastronomical 

 taste as below, for they confined their attentions to the 

 worm, and would not look at the minnow on the pater- 

 noster which I had thrown out at the side. The fish bit 

 very " gingerly," and by no means every swim, belying 

 the character giyen them in the angling-books of being 

 " greedy biters." But the biting was fairly continuous for 

 two hours, during which I took about a score perch and 

 about ten roach. 



And a handsome dish of perch they were, as ever need 

 gladden an angler's eye. Among them were two which drew 

 on the steelyards 2\ lbs. each, several pounders and three- 

 quarter pounders, and hardly a small fish at all. I took a 

 few more fish on our return homewards at our morning 

 swim, and when we came to ascertain the sum total of our 

 fish it was found to stand thus : — Thirty-one perch, six- 

 teen roach, and two jack ; total weight, 35 lbs., of which 

 the thirty-one perch weighed 20 lbs. I do not say that 

 this was a supremely wonderful day, even for the Thames, 

 where the perch are very capricious and shy, but it was a 

 day such as a Thames angler seldom has among the perch. 

 A 2 lbs. fish is a rara avis in the Thames, and to take two 

 over this weight on the same day was enough to make me 

 very happy. I often think that the older a man gets the 

 more delighted he is at taking good fish. I have already 

 intimated, in reference to the day's fishing, that the 

 perch would not touch the minnows ; and in the evening 

 we met two gentlemen who had been toiling all day 

 with this bait in Lord Boston's water, higher up the 

 river, and had not taken a single fish ! But my day's 

 sport pales before one related to me shortly afterwards, 



