THE THAMES. 57 



perhaps under rather than above the average size. He is a 

 game, handsome little fellow, and not to be despised as a table 

 delicacy. Learn how to master the art of dace^fishing with 

 your fly rod, and you have graduated to a full trout degree. 

 Indeed, a quicker eye and lighter wrist are necessary for 

 dace. The thing must be done on the instant if at all. 

 Should you, as I have had the felicity of doing in the Colne, 

 find the fish feeding voraciously, and have a couple of bold 

 half-pounders on your line at once, you may be ready to 

 admit that, in the absence of trout, dace are not beneath an 

 experienced man's notice. 



Beginning at Ham I^ane, and whipping your way to 

 Teddington (taking care always to secure the tide at its 

 first ebb), will afford excellent fun, wind and weather per- 

 mitting. And the best plan is to use a short line, and, 

 where the shallows cease, fish close under the bank. The 

 natives — men in fustian and smocks — with -the rudest of 

 tackle, generally fish down the stream, casting with the 

 left hand ; and it is no uncommon thing to see them walk 

 home with a pocket-handkerchief filled with fish that will 

 make an ample and luxurious meal for their family. 



Chub take a large fly well in the Thames, and the easiest 

 road to their good graces is this : let your boat drift quietly 

 with the stream — the slower the better — about a dozen or 

 fifteen yards from the bushes under which the chub are 

 known to congregate, and parallel with the bank. Use a 

 large black or red palmer; drop it upon the boughs, and 

 thence seductively into the water ; and it will warm your 

 heart to see how heartily the lumbering chevens rush to 

 their destruction. Beware of the first bolt. Here, as 

 everywhere else, it is the pace that kills. " Let him go " — 



