If you are just clear of the rocks your leads should rest on the ground, but if not you must haul up sufficient to keep the hooks clear. Large quantities of Congers are also taken with bulters or long lines, fitted with two or three hundred hooks. One-third of an inch is a good thickness for the back line of a Conger-trot, and a very stout brass or copper swivel should be spliced into it at every twenty fathoms, which will be found. very convenient for taking out kinks. wetted, stretched, and dried before use. 'Trot-Basket and Hook-Holder,' p. 143.) be three feet long and nine feet apart: a swivel on each is a great improvement.

It should be well

(See 'Trot' and The snoods should

Whilst fishing for Conger or other large fish you should always be provided with a strong gaff-hook, as large as a butcher's meat-hook, firmly secured to a handle two and a half feet in length, wherewith to lift on board large fish which might else endanger the tackle. At the top of the handle a knob should be left, and the wood be made smooth, that you may be enabled to allow the gaff to turn in your hand, for a large Conger can screw himself round with such violence that, if held rigidly, the dislocation of elbow or shoulder is by no means beyond the range of possibility.

The Conger, in common with the Freshwater Eel, is nocturnal in its habits, and rarely feeds freely in water of less than twenty fathoms' depth during the day; at night, however, they roam far and wide, approaching the shore quite closely, especially on the flowing tide in summer and autumn, and may be caught with a throw-out or leger-line (fig. 43, p. 140.)

A nutritious soup is made from Conger, thickened with oatmeal and flavoured according to taste, but the flesh is not in much repute, except amongst the poorer classes. A ten-inch cut, however, out of the thickest part of a Conger of 10lbs. and upwards, filled with veal stuffing, sewn up, and baked with a bit of fat bacon on the top, will be found a really good dish.

In unhooking Congers push the disgorger down on to the bend of the hook, take a turn of the snood round the stick, and twist out the hook.

THE SKATE.

(Raia batis.)

This member of the Ray family is very numerous on sandy and oozy ground both in the British and other seas, and is taken in large numbers in the trawl nets and also on trots, as well as occasionally by hook and line when ground-fishing for Whiting, Cod, or Conger. A Ray-fish trot or bulter should consist of a Cod bank-line sixty fathoms in length, with hooks Nos. 6, 7, or 8, fig. 62, p. 210, on double Salmon twine, laid up with the nossil-cock or fisherman's spinner (fig. 66, p. 216), in the following manner :-Cut six feet of the twine, attach the ends to two of the hooked spindles, hang the lead to the middle, and spin up the snood as shown and directed at p. 216. The little spinning jack is also very useful for this work (fig. 23, p. 70).

Bend on the snoods at intervals of 9 feet, by opening the strand with a marline-spike or pricker, introducing the end through the opening, and making a knot on it. Then, making a clove-hitch on either side of it, tighten them, and it will never draw. Bait with half a large Sand-Eel or a whole one of moderate size, pieces of Mackerel or Long-Nose an inch wide, half a Sand-Smelt, or pieces of Pilchard. Attach a twentypound stone to each end, and other stones of a pound weight at intervals, to prevent rolling. Shoot it on smooth ground, and you will take Rays and other fish. On a flat sandy shore, where there is a considerable rise and fall, you can use this without a boat, especially at spring tides.

Amongst the greater number of species and varieties of the Ray genus enumerated by Couch, Yarrell, Gosse, and others, there are, besides the Skate, two which are taken in large quantities in trawls, on long lines, and occasionally when handline fishing these are the Homelyn and the Thornback. The Homelyn much resembles the Skate, and like it has smooth sides; the Thornback has several large white buttons under the skin, which carry strong recurved spines, very similar to the claws of a cat. The flesh of the two former is excellent, and furnishes the crimped Skate of the London market; but that of the Thornback is woolly and tasteless. As an illustration of

the extraordinary change in the value of fish, I may mention that until within the last few years Skate was not worth sending to the London market; then, as other fish became scarcer, it was sold crimped at 4d. per pound, but the price has been often much higher.

The Fireflaire has a frightful double spine on its tail, with which it inflicts fearful wounds, but its liver is reputed to be excellent for scalds and sores. The best part of a Skate is the The flesh is much used as bait for Crab and Lobster

jowl. pots.

DOG-FISH AND SHARKS.
(Squalida).

Dog-fish are often very abundant round the British coasts, and Sharks are by no means uncommon, although the latter are neither so numerous nor voracious as those of warm climates. They are both looked on as the plague of fishermen, driving away other fish, devouring them on the hooks or in the meshes of the net, of which, as well as of lines and snoods, they make dreadful havoc. The Sharks sometimes swallow Congers already hooked, and are thus taken occasionally in the British Seas; there have been several instances in Guernsey.

THE HERRING (Clupea harengus), PILCHARD (C. pilchardus), SPRAT (C. sprattus), AND WHITE BAIT (C. latulus).

In 6 Remarks on Nets' I have adverted to these fish. Pennant mentions that the Herring will take a fly, and they are often caught therewith in the Scotch and Irish lochs at the present day. I have caught a few at Plymouth whilst Atherine fishing. They are taken for bait by jigging on the Irish coasts; that is, by lowering naked hooks cast into a piece of lead and jerking up. It is of course unsportsmanlike, and only defensible as a means of procuring bait. The well-known Sprat is caught in moored nets in a tide-way, in seines, and in drift-nets of fine twine. White Bait are caught in bag and dip-nets in tidal rivers. Dr. Günther has undoubtedly proved them to be the fry of the herring. There are many other fish curious in their conformation and habits, but which are taken by chance in

some of the methods described in this work. In the pages of Yarrell and Couch the student of Ichthyology will find them illustrated and described at length.

THE FRESHWATER EEL.

(Murana anguilla.)

As the Freshwater Eel is very numerous in most harbours

and tidal rivers, the following directions

may not perhaps be considered out of place in the present work :

They may be taken both by bobbing and by hook and line.

Bobbing is usually practised from a boat, and in the following manner : Procure forty or fifty large worms, and string them on worsted or coarse thread by passing a large needle through them from head to tail, then make a coil of them by wrapping them round your hand, and tying them across with a piece of strong twine or tape, which will not be so likely to cut them. Fasten the bunch securely to a piece of strong fishing-line or whip-cord twelve feet in length (fig. 49).

If unable to procure a needle sufficiently large, tie the worsted with fine waxed silk to a piece of iron or brass wire, seven inches in length, and of the thickness of a stocking needle.

You must provide a bell-shaped piece of lead of about three ounces in

weight, cast with a hole through the FIG. 49.-Lead and Clot of centre, which slide down over the line as shown in the cut.

Worms for bobbing from a boat.

The best rod for this fishing is a clean cut off a fir plank eight feet in length, planed round, an inch and a half in thick

ness at the bottom and three-quarters at the top, where a small hole should be bored, and afterwards burned out with a redhot wire, through which the line is to be passed as the line will run easily through this hole, you can adjust it to the depth of water. The boat should be moored with two anchors in the following manner: first drop one anchor and push the boat about twenty yards down the stream; now drop the other, and gather on the first, until the boat is midway between the two, with the bow up the stream; haul in the rope of the second anchor taut, and your boat will now ride fair with the tide, and will not sheer about, which is of the first importance.

Regulate your line that it may be three or four inches less than the depth of the water, and sound the bottom with your bob every two or three seconds, lifting it off the bottom, and sounding again until you have a bite, which is easily perceived, as the Eel tugs very strongly raise your line quickly but steadily, and your fish in dropping off will fall into the boat; great numbers are taken by this method. Always bob in shallow water from two to six feet in depth, for if it is much deeper a great many will fall off.

N.B. If you use worsted, which is preferable to thread, as it gets entangled more readily in the teeth of the Eels, draw it three or four times over a piece of soap, and you will thread the Worms more easily.

I have usually had greater sport on the flowing than during the ebbing tide.

Clotting for Eels.-Clotting for Eels is very similar to Bobbing, and is adapted for rivers and brooks, where a boat is

FIG. 50.-Baited Clotting Pole.

not required. Your pole should be ten or twelve feet in length, to the top of which a piece of iron wire of the thickness of a quarter of an inch is to be fastened, eighteen inches in length, having an eye turned at the end, to which eye you attach your clot of Worms (fig. 50). The best time is immediately after