Fair catch

“ Then we met my younger brother coming to us with quite a great fish, half a pound perhaps, which he had caught in a burn. Then, for the first time, my soul knew the fierce passion of jealousy, the envy of the angler. Almost for the last time, too; for, I know not why it is, and it proves me no true fisherman, I am not discontented by the successes of others. If one cannot catch fish oneself, surely the next best thing is to see other people catch them.
My own progress was now checked for long by a constitutional and insuperable aversion to angling with worm. ”

“ Remember that the fighting qualities of fish are as a rule best developed in those which live in rapid and turbulent water, and in those which pursue their prey and catch it by their own nimbleness. But any fish will fight better if you make the struggle more even by using delicate tackle. You win then only by dexterity of handling, which is one of the great charms of angling, and about the only one, as regards the mere catching of fish, on which the experienced angler sets much value. The secret of success with delicate tackle may be told in two words—care and coolness. ”

“ If there is a trout rising well under the pendant boughs that trail in the water, if there is a brake of briars behind me, a strong wind down stream, for that trout, in that impregnable situation, I am impelled to fish. If I raise him I strike, miss him, catch up in his tree, swish the cast off into the briars, break my top, break my heart, but—that is the humour of it. The passion, or instinct, being in all senses blind, must no doubt be hereditary. ”

“ It may be illustrated by two fishermen fishing on the river-bank with hook and line, and dividing the catch at night. No more fish will be caught than if each fished separately and carried home his own catch. ”

“ As soon as a strike is felt and duly hooked he sees that the line is drawn in steadily so as not to afford the fish a chance to rid itself of the hook, and, as soon as it appears, he drops his oar, seizes the net, and lands the catch to the great delight of his less-experienced fare. ”

“ For if a catch could be missed (and most catches can) , I was the man to miss it. Swift ones used to hit me and hurt me, long ones I always misjudged, little simple poppy ones spun out of my fingers. Now the unlucky thing about Cricket, for a Duffer, is that your misfortunes do not hurt yourself alone. It is not as in a single at Golf, it is not as in fishing, or riding, or wherever you have no partner. To drop catches is to madden the bowler not unnaturally, and to lengthen the period of leather-hunting. ”

“ You see the set and determined face of the catcher as he comes running toward you, his mind on nothing but the catch he hopes to make, he sees nothing but the ball. You, yourself, are thinking of nothing else. ”

“ But it was no easy task we had set ourselves. In order to convict a man of illegal fishing, it was necessary to catch him in the act with all the evidence of the crime about him—the hooks, the lines, the fish, and the man himself. ”

“ Now don’t sniff, you owners of hand-made split-bamboo rods and scorners of all fishing except that for trout or bass! If you will just think back along the years until you catch sight of yourself as you once were, you will realize that the boy knows but one rule when fishing, and that is, “Get there!” Methods do not matter to him so that he catches fish. ”

“ But do not be discouraged. Cheer up. You will learn in the course of time. A young man of your intelligence can learn anything. Come now, how many did you take?"
"I have not counted them, Monsieur," said Jean, "but I see that you have made a good catch, a very good catch."
"A good catch? Well, I may say so," said the City Man, a little nettled. "It is the catch of my life. See! I will pour them out on the pebbles. Yes, a nice pile of trout. Let us count them. One--two--three ... seventy-two--seventy-three--seventy-four--all good fish--and this two-pounder makes seventy-five. A good day's work. ”

“ We certainly have nothing in common with those who fish for a livelihood, [Pg 166] unless it be a desire to catch fish. We have, in point of fact, no closer relationship than this with the murderously inclined, whose only motive in fishing is to make large catches, and whose sole pleasure in the pursuit is the gratification of a greedy propensity. Nevertheless we, and those with whom we have so little sympathy, are by a sort of unavoidable law of gravitation classed together in the same fraternity, and called fishermen. ”

“ These abide not good old Anglers' Law, but bob and splash in other people's swims, fray away the fish they cannot catch, and desire not that experter anglers should, do muddy the stream and block its course, do net and poach and foul-hook in such noisy, conscienceless, unmannerly sort, that even honest angling becometh a bitter labour and aggravation. ”

“ Proper tackle for all purposes—How to catch bait—The fly fisherman—General fishing rules
Fishing is one sport of boyhood that we never outgrow our love for. Some of the most enthusiastic fishermen are gray-haired men. We often hear about the boy with the bent pin and the piece of thread who catches more fish than the expert fisherman with modern, up-to-date tackle, but I doubt if it is so. As a rule the better our tackle the more fish we shall catch. If the country boy catches the most fish, it is simply because he is better acquainted with the places where the fish hide or feed. ”

“ The moral of all this—if it has any moral—is, use hooks according to the size of fish you expect to catch.
And, when you are in a permanent camp, and fishing is very poor, try frogging. It is not a sport of a high order, though it may be called angling—and it can be made amusing, with hook and line. I have seen educated ladies in the wilderness, fishing for frogs with an eagerness and enthusiasm not surpassed by the most devoted angler with his favorite cast of flies. ”

“ If you could see it twirling and wiggling in the water when it was dragged after the boat and we pulled fast, you’d see it looked just like a little live fish, and the mack’rel shoot theirselves after it through the water and hook theirselves. That’s the best bait for a mack’rel, and after the same fashion one nigger’s the best bait to catch more niggers. ”

“ Their joyous shouts tell the anxious women on shore that the catch is a good one. They lift the net now with the greatest possible care, and I begin to see its silvery contents. The fish, which almost cover its exposed surface, shine like new standard dollars. The men shake and strip them off, and they fall a glittering heap into the bottom of the boat. ”

“ As a rule you prefer when in a punt to catch alternately with your friend; that is more like cricket, and indeed there is nothing more risky, unless both anglers are remarkably cool, than two lively fish being played in so small a space. ”

“ Who is there that has not met, on club waters, the ardent and unsuccessful angler who wanders up and down, covering vast stretches of water, and effectually scaring many otherwise takeable fish, in the vain hope that he may find some purblind trout idiotic enough to take his proffered fly? I consider that unwritten etiquette demands that the utmost care should be taken by fishermen to do all in their power to prevent spoiling the sport of those who may be following. ”

“ It will sometimes happen that when separated from your stores, short of food, and with very few appliances with you, a catch of fish proves highly acceptable, and tackle of some kind has to be extemporised. ”

“ There is also a line drawn between the man who fishes for amusement alone and he who fishes for profit. The division in the latter instance may not be so broad as it is in the former, but, nevertheless, it is wide enough to distinctly separate the two classes. Now I think the fair and amateur angler is in a great many instances unaware of the shifts and dodges adopted by the poacher and the pothunter to fill their pockets, and of the consequent hindrance to his own sport. ”

“ Angling has from time immemorial been followed, and ought to be indulged in unchecked by arbitrary laws, as the birthright of everyone, but particularly of the sedentary and the studious. It is cruel to think of debarring the fair angler, by any checks whatever; the salmon fishers may, indeed, begrudge to see such fill his creel with a few scores of the fry ”

“ Sometimes one man ’tends dozens of holes, running this way and that as he sees he has a catch, to take the fish off, and rebait the hook.”
“Are all the tip-ups alike, Phil?” asked the deeply interested Lub.
“Not by any means, although they have the same common idea of notifying the fisherman that he has made a catch,” the other continued. “Some I have seen consist of a stick, with a cord and a red piece of cloth; when the fish is caught he drags on the extra cord, and this causes the flag to appear at the top of the stick set upright in the ice. ”

“ If you bring yourself to study how little you require for a day's outing, it is astonishing how much you will by and by leave behind. We are prone, of course, to make arrangements for a great catch, both in numbers and weights; take a 23-lb. creel for bringing home a brace of pounders, enough tackle to last the season through, and each article on scale as to solidity. Once in a hundred times, and not more, will the result be equal to the preparation. ”

“ But sometimes, of course, this is impossible, and a really brilliant catch may be made by a fine fielder running hard and using only one hand. Unfortunately one often sees catches attempted in this brilliant manner which ought to have been made safe in the other and safer way. Remember, there is far more merit in making a catch easy by good judgment than in bringing off a very difficult catch rendered difficult by lateness in starting.
A man can hardly be considered a really first-rate field until he can field well everywhere, except perhaps at the wicket. ”

“ At dawn the log-boats are launched and are paddled out of sight, where the long deep nets are floated. The water teems with fish. The catch is sold to middlemen, who dispose of it to the market stall-holders. A considerable quantity is sent up country, and a large percentage is salted for native use. ”

“ When you have hooked a fish, don't let him run if you can possibly help it, so as to slacken your line, if you do, you stand a chance of loosing him, as the sudden cessation of a strain upon the line frequently disengages the hold. If you want to discover what fish are feeding upon, open the first you catch, and then you will be able to judge correctly. ”

“ A Word to Fishermen Those of us who fish in a fair, well-bred and reasonable way, for the purpose of recreation and as a means of increasing the table pleasures of ourselves or our friends, may well regret the apparently unalterable decree which gives to all those who fish, under the spur of any motive—good, bad or indifferent—the name of fishermen. ”

“ If we can only hope to catch half the amount of fish our progenitors did, what are the prospects of the next generation? Shall we have to fall back on black bass or rainbow trout to secure a race of free-rising fish? ”

“ The fish that they catch they must bring first to him, or they would not be allowed to walk over his grounds to catch them; and he will give just what he pleases for the most valuable part of their pannier. ”

“ You ascertain the price of the whole catch of the boat, and then each man takes his third or his fourth, as the case may be?- Yes, whatever the catch may be, each man gets his share of it.
12,885. Would there be any difficulty in paying for the fish in that way in the summer fishing?-In the summer fishing it would not work very well, because it would not do to give the men their cash just off-hand; but there is a way in which it could be done equally well. ”

“ No. They can stay under water longer than any human beings I have ever seen. And after the catch of the day is brought in, it is put up at auction, and then there is excitement enough to satisfy anyone. ”

“ No one knows better than you that men are always trying to catch fish, both by hook and net. Now, if ever you see a worm dangling in the water in the shape of a hook, leave it alone, or you will be a dead fish ”

“ And Skipper seems to forget we be fishermen workin' on shares. If us catch no fish, us do be workin' without a farden of pay. My eighth of the last catch wan't enough to buy my two kids new boots, what with the bad market, and all they Londing buyers blatherin' about the big catches brought in by they Grimsby and Lowestoft trawlers. ”

“ Some people have conscientious scruples about fishing. I respect them. I had them once myself. Wantonly to destroy, for mere sport, the innocent life, in lake and river, seemed to me a cruelty and a shame. But people must fish. Now, then, how shall your theory and practice be harmonized? Practice can't yield. ”

“ You had hoped to catch a goodly trout in that hole, but what of that? The sight of a harmless hour of mirth is better than a fish, any day.
Possibly you will overtake another fisherman on the stream. It may be one of those fabulous countrymen, with long cedar poles and bed-cord lines, who are commonly reported to catch such enormous strings of fish, but who rarely, so far as my observation goes, do anything more than fill their pockets with fingerlings. ”

“ If I stretch a net in the sea, do I not acquire the possession of the fish caught in it, so soon as they are caught? Yet every other fisherman that passes by has more power of excluding me than I have of excluding him. ”

“ A word, brother angler, and I have done. Learn to cast a fly, and you will never go back to bait fishing from choice. Get good flies, and you won’t regret the extra money they cost you; don’t buy cheap imitations or trade made flies—“they are frauds.”
Don’t buy a pole big enough for the staff of a Philistine Goliath; to fish for trout, buy a fine rod, take care of it, learn to use it thoroughly. Never buy a cheap rod; a rod fit for trouting must be as fine as it is possible to make them, and it should not make a shadow on the water. Cheap rods are like cheap guns, scham-dahms! ”