REELS. 65 
where about doubles it(?). The doubled leverage will tell, from 
the first putting together of the rod until the gaffing of the 
last fish of the day gives the wearied muscles of the right arm 
and back a not unwelcome respite. 
The last point is the check mechanism, shown in drawing, 
fig. 2, which ought to be simple, and at the same time easily 
accessible—accessible, that is, without any ‘taking to pieces’ 
of the reel. In my ‘combined reel’ the check machinery is 
merely covered by a hinged lid (a, B, c), sufficiently close- 
fitting to be practically water-tight, while admitting of being 
opened at once by giving the catch, c, a turn with the point of 
a knife-blade. 
The first time I recollect noticing a similar form of check- 
cover was on a reel made, I believe, by Bernard & Son, for 
my friend Mr. F. T. Corrance. This was a light reel with one 
side ebonite, and intended principally for boat work in Norway. 
It will thus be seen that for whatever merits the combined 
reel may possess I can personally claim very little credit—but 
if the outcome of the combination produces any approach to 
an ‘ideal salmon reel,’ it matters little to fishermen from 
whose hands they receive it. 
The weight of this reel, 44 inches, is 1 Ib. 6 oz. ; and that 
of a ‘best London-made reel’ of the same diameter, of one or 
other of the similar patterns already noticed, somewhere about 
1 lb. 13 oz.—or 7 0z. more. 
The reel is registered and manufactured by Messrs. Farlow. 
Messrs. Hardy’s reel is very much lighter than the ‘ London- 
made’ reel, and not quite so light as my pattern. There is (on 
a 43-inch reel) a difference apparently of 3 oz. in favour of the 
former, but it is not so in reality owing to the difference in the 
width of the groove in the two patterns. In Hardy’s reel it is 
17 inch, and in mine 1}@ inch, the result being that a 
4-inch reel of my pattern will carry the same amount of line 
as Hardy’s 4}-inch. 
It must be admitted, however—all questions of comparative 
weight: apart—that Messrs. Hardy’s ‘ revolving-plate reels’ are 
I. F 
