THE PEECH. 233 



I must leave my readers to refer to standard books on 

 angling for definite instructions as to how to fish for perch, 

 &c, for, once more to repeat it, these Notes do not profess 

 to give such instruction to anglers. As a rule, small perch 

 in stagnant water can be taken by almost any tyro in the 

 piscatorial art, and with the roughest of tackle. The old 

 books on angling tell us that the perch is a " bold biter," 

 and so small perch are in many waters. He is in one sense 

 more voracious than the jack, and, as far as I know, he 

 has almost as good a digestion. In fact, he is well-nigh 

 omnivorous. He will take any kind of worm, from the 

 tail of well-scoured lob, delicate as the best prepared tripe 

 or cods' sounds, to a bunch of stinking brandlings, the 

 effects of the handling of which the best antigropelous 

 soap and scrubbing-brush can hardly efface in a week ; 

 but let me add that the most killing worm I know of for 

 Thames perch is a small red one found in abundance in 

 the wet soil by the river-side, for the knowledge of which 

 fact I am indebted to my old college friend, the Rev. R. 

 Howard Rice, Vicar of Sutton Courtney, near Abingdon. 

 He will take a salmi of gentles, a nubble of paste, an arti- 

 ficial spinning bait of almost any pattern, yea, even a 

 gaudy fly in some waters. As for ordinary spinning and 

 live baits — gudgeon, roach, dace, chub — he has little 

 choice generally speaking, though perhaps a gudgeon is 

 his favourite. And what specimens of live baits will he 

 seize ! When you are fishing for large jack, a perch, of 

 3 lbs. say, will take a bait intended for a jack of 12 lbs. He 

 is like the little boy of nursery tradition, whose eyes were 

 bigger than his stomach ; or, perhaps, I should say the 

 perch seems to cater for his larder, calculating by the size 

 of his mouth rather than by the size of his gullet or his 



