20 An Anglers Paradise. 
bank at last, and safely landed. Another cast or two and then 
another fish is hooked, more playful even than the last ; he plays, 
he fights, leaps, rushes, and lies panting in the net, then in the 
creel. 
But why the change from fingerlings to what you may call 
fish ? 
It is because that wonderful provision long ago designed by 
Nature for mankind, giving him dominion over all her creatures, 
whether beast, or fish, or fowl, has been made use of, by which 
the water of a simple moorland rill can now with human aid 
produce enormously. 
It must be quite apparent, even to the most casual observer 
of the laws of Nature, that there exists a wonderful balance of 
animal and vegetable life, which has been kept up for ages, by the 
destruction of one species by another. Man has the power given 
to him of altering that balance, and of adjusting Nature’s laws to 
meet his own requirements. Interference with Nature’s balance, 
however, is a matter which should receive serious consideration 
before action is commenced. Experience teaches us undoubtedly, 
that where man thoughtlessly interferes with it the result means 
loss to himself, and as an example of this we may take the rabbit 
pest at the Antipodes. 
Where thoughtfully done, however, the result is often one of 
great benefit. Of this there are a good many examples, both in 
the animal and vegetable kingdoms. The axiom we know applies 
very largely to the cultivation of the land, and it also applies 
in an even greater ratio to the cultivation of the water. Man 
has now the means of dealing with it in such a manner, that 
it is quiet practicable to utilize the small rills of our mountain 
or lowland valleys, and make them produce an abundance of 
large fish, where the merest dwarfs existed before.* It has 
*In the case of many strcams there is, unfortunately, a very bad reason for the fish 
never or only rarely exceeding a certain size ; and that is that nearly every one above, say, 
a quarter of a pound in weight is taken out by the poacher. He fishes chiefly with a net 
which will not take the smaller fish, but which is most destructive amongst large ones. 
Often have I come across him, or his shadow, out at night, but as long as the law winks 
at such proceedings, by imposing penalties, when caught, at which he chuckles, so long 
will he continue to depopulate our streams. The-net used in this part is usually the 
shackle or bag-net. I have sometimes used one for obtaining spawners from a stream, 
