298 ANACANTHINI. 



five inclies in length, which at once gave chase. The whiting dodged round its 

 friendly medusa, but a second pollack joined the pursuit. An unlucky movement 

 drove the pursued one from its shelter, and an exciting chase immediately 

 commenced. Some more pollacks joined in and like a pack of hounds ran their 

 victim down, which they killed for sport as they did not attempt to feed upon 

 it. So eager were the pursuers that when stones were thrown at them they 

 showed no alarm although at other times a single stone would instil terror. Mr. 

 Dunn has observed them springing out of the water after air bubbles made by a 

 boat passing quickly through the sea. 



Sars observed off the coast of Norway that the pollack systematically chased 

 the young codfish. Schools of the former appeared to surround the little 

 codfishes on all side, making the circle narrower and narrower, till all the codfish 

 were gathered into one lump, which they then by a quick movement chased up to 

 the surface of the water. They were now attacked on two sides, below by the 

 pollack, above by the sea-gulls. The pollack were also observed to treat sand-eels 

 in the same manner, surrounding a school of them, and forcing them towards the 

 surface of the water where gulls assisted in their destruction. This fish is 

 likewise partial to herrings. 



Means of capture. — It sometimes bites keenly, gorging the bait at once, and 

 also takes a fly, but this sport is best tried from sunset for about two hours, 

 especially if a fresh breeze is blowing, and then it rises freely at a gaudy artificial 

 fly, roughly made of red and white feathers, but is more choice in its selection 

 of food than is the coal-fish. The boat should be rowed along very gently 

 at about four or five hundred yards from the shore, or in a suitable locality, 

 and the fly be allowed to float from twenty to thirty yards from the stern of 

 the boat. Although the young flood or slack water is generally best for this 

 fishing in some places, the best sport is to be had at high water. Off Plymouth 

 it has been observed that as a rule falling water gives the best sport in the open 

 sea, but at the points of bays special configurations of the shore and outlying 

 rooks may alter this general rule. Pollack of small or moderate size will also 

 come close in shore where ridges of rock jut out under a few fathoms of water. 

 A little rain is often conducive to the success of this fishing. At different places 

 and likewise different fishermen will praise various sorts of bait for whifling, but 

 live sand-eels would appear to be as good as any when procurable. A flsherman 

 in the Field observes that failing these he finds as the two best baits a peculiar 

 red india-rubber eel on one line, and on the other a spinner with the back of the 

 hook dressed with prepared fish skin and a piece of the same skin on the point 

 of the hook, for which is substituted when procurable a slice from the tail of a 

 longnose or mackerel. But it is not always easy to tempt a pollack with bait 

 while pilchards are about. 



Baits. — Sand-eels, Ammodytes, are their favourite bait, or an imitation insect 

 known as " the Belgian grub," which is modelled in plaster on to the shank of a 

 hook and painted red and white : it is fitted with gut and a swivel. The end 

 grub should be larger than the rest, with a piece of red india-rubber, resembling 

 a brown elastic band, attached to the hook, and which when drawn through the 

 water represents a wriggling sand-eel. Higher up, on two yards of salmon-gut, 

 two or three smaller grubs may be placed without the eel and attached like 

 Lob-flies on a casting-line. At the head of the gut should be a small swivel, then 

 four or five yards of snooding attached to a coarser hand-line, which is wound round 

 the usual square frame as a reel. At the end of the hand-line, or at its junction 

 with the snooding, is strung a small leaden weight of 2 or 3 oz. so that while 

 being dragged through the water the lead may be near but not on the bottom, 

 while the snooding and gut cast with the bait, being lighter, follow at a few feet 

 distance above the rocks and weeds where the pollack like to frequent. The 

 large summer pollack often refuse the " Belgian grub " and have to be tempted 

 by live sand-eels or artificial white-flies. Cockles have been praised as a bait 



* Mr. Dunn informs me that a diamond was said to have been found inside a pollack at 

 Talmouth. 



