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not less than three or more than five ounces should be used, and the snood may be of gimp four yards size 20, or copper wire of gauge 21. The lead, if of boat form, should be mounted with a piece of double horse-hair thirty-six hairs' thickness, served round with stout waxed thread, projecting from each end half the length of the lead. Join the wire snood to this with an inch swivel, and connect the gut and wire, or gimp, with one of half inch size. A pair of these lines are necessary. The plummet lead with revolving chopstick (fig. 39, p. 124), as for Mackerel, is suitable for Pollacking, but a very considerable latitude is allowable in the shape of leads for whiffing for Pollack, and either the conical, fig-shaped, or boat-shaped, may be used, the form not being of great importance, because the boat should always move more slowly than in Mackerel-fishing, for which the boat leads are not adapted from their tendency to sheer and jump when towed along at any considerable speed. For whiffing under sail one pound will be found a good weight, but in certain positions, as in tide-races, you are compelled to use a two-pound lead, and if of plummet form all must have the revolving chopstick. You may consider you have good 'dray-way' through the water, as the fishermen term it, when your lines form with the surface an angle of about 45 degrees, and you should pull, or set just sufficient sail for the required rate. I recommend the lines to be marked at 3, 6, and 9 fathoms. When wind and tide are in opposition (if both are not so strong as to cause too much sea) is the most favourable opportunity for whiffing under sail, as you can then adjust your canvas to a nicety, but under oars or sculling, a calm or very nearly a calm is most advantageous. In whiffing under oars or sculling almost any punt or sea-going boat will answer, for instance a yacht's dingy 10 to 14 feet long, and one should take the paddles whilst the other tends the two lines. For one person a single line is ample, and the boat may be either sculled or pulled as found most convenient. In Pollacking under sail two lines may be managed by one hand, and any sized boat under 10 tons will answer; but were I to choose I should prefer an Itchen rigged boat of 5 tons, with the addition of a mizen, as it is so very useful in whiffing with the jib

or staysail, when the mainsail is not required. The helmsman must be a good pilot, and not become so absorbed in his sport as to forget which way his craft is heading, or he may speedily come to grief on the rocks. The Crab-pot corks must be diligently looked out for or the gear will become unrigged by loss of the hooks and snoods. Amateurs at Plymouth use short rods about a foot long of cane or whalebone stuck into the gunwale, or into little zinc or copper clamps nailed against it; these first yield to a fish, and then allow the line to slip off the top, thereby avoiding breakage. These little rods are called twiggers, and show a bite immediately. The Crab-pot corks are often run under by the tide, which causes great risk to your tackle, and unfortunately they are most frequently placed off the headlands, and in the very spots required to sail over, therefore it is best to do so only at slack tide, when they are all bearing at the surface, and during the continuance of the stream to follow drift-line fishing.

The Cornish Whiffing Line consists of a stout Whiting or Conger line without any weight or sinker, the absence of this being supplied by the length and weight of the line itself. A good method of making the snood is with two fathoms of stout gimp or fine copper wire, secured to a brass swivel 1 inch long. A loop of double hemp half the thickness of the main line, and 6 inches long, is spliced into the swivel, and looped over a knot on the end of the main line. A second small swivel is attached to the further end of the gimp or wire, and to this 3 to 6 feet of very stout single or double Salmon gut. Ten, fifteen, twenty, or more fathoms of line are used according to the depth of water. This kind of line is much used single-handed when sculling the boat along with one oar over the stern, as being without lead, it does not sink so rapidly as to get foul of the rocky bottom, like a leaded line. Pollack, Mackerel, and Bass are taken with it. It answers well also as a stern-line in a tideway at anchor for these fish, trailing back clear of the other lines. A slip of parchment inch wide 1 inch long is an additional attraction with Rag-Worm bait, and an imitation indiarubber band in parchment will also catch Pollack.

G

Baits for Whiffing may be used both dead and living, which affords a much wider range for choice than in drift-line fishing. Living and dead Sand-Eels, small dead Freshwater Eels (fig. 25) and Lampreys (fig. 26) from 4 to 6 inches, Lob or large Earth-Worms, Lugs, Rag, Rock, or Mud-Worms, slips of Long-Nose or Mackerel 3 to 5 inches long and to wide, unsmoked bacon or pork skin, Gurnard or Bass skin, and white leather or rag of the same dimensions, in addition to artificial baits, as spinners and imitative Sand-Eels, with

FIG. 25.-Freshwater Eel (dead bait for Whiffing).

white and red and fancy flies, including a rough kind of palmer or caterpillar made of goat's-hair, which is especially good for Bass. In addition to these, we have three valuable artificial baits for Pollack, which owe their discovery to accident. The first is the red indiarubber band, which was, it seems, tried by an amateur short of bait, who happened to have one of them as a fastening to his pocket-book. After cutting it he hooked one end, and took several Pollack whiffing. It is the

on

FIG. 26.-River Lamprey (dead bait for Whiffing).

custom now to whip one end to the head of the hook (fig. 27), instead of baiting it as a living Rag-Worm, to which it bears a remarkable resemblance. The most useful size is about 1 inch in diameter. There are two kinds of these indiarubber rings, one lies flat when placed on a table, the other rests on its edge. The right kind is that which lies flat like a quoit or Saturn's ring; and if my reader will divide one and hold it up by one end, he will see at once the reason it should be preferred, as it hangs in a curl, which causes a rapid life-like action

when drawn through the water, and thus becomes very attractive to fish. The action is so rapid that the eye cannot follow it, and it has the appearance of two, instead of one worm on the hook. The other two baits are Brook's double twist spinning Eel or Lug and Hearder's Captain Tom's spinning SandEel or Lug-Worm (figs. 28 and 29), with which numbers of

INDIARUBBER BAITS.

FIG. 27. Rubber Band Imitation Rag-Worm.

FIG. 28.

Brook's Double Twist
Spinning Eel or Lug-Worm.

FIG. 29. Hearder's Captain Tom's Spinning Sand-Eel.

Pollack and Bass have been taken, the so-called Sand-Eel being made of the grey indiarubber pipe placed on the hook so as to form an elbow at the bend, which causes it to spin

when drawn through the water, whilst the Lug-Worm is a red bait of the same kind. Brass swivels are attached to the heads of each, to provide for the spinning action. The spinning Sand-Eel and Lugs are taken by both Pollack and Bass, the Grey Eel especially in the dusk, as well as by daylight. With the Red Eel or Lug a friend took off Hartland Point over sixty Bass 3 to 9 lbs. weight on one visit. Having lived on such a variety of coasts, including rocky, sandy, and shingly shores, some abounding in, and others having little or no natural bait, but on many of which much fish could be taken, I have had to try all manner of things, and have given a considerable variety to choose from in the present article. The best natural baits for whiffing are without doubt living Sand-Eels and Rag or Mud-Worms; the living Sand-Eel to be placed on the hook as in the tideway, and the dead as I have here shown in the cut of the Freshwater Eel (fig. 25); the Rag-Worm, when two are used, as at fig. 21, p. 68, and if the fish are shy or bait runs short as at fig. 31, p. 85, to do which enter the

FIG. 30.-Tail part of an Eel (Whiffing bait).

hook about of an inch below the head, and bring out the point 1 inch down the worm, and stick the smaller hook through the head.

Lampreys and Freshwater Eels are to be placed on the hook in the same manner, but the point of the large hook should be brought out lower down, as shown in figs. 25 and 26, p. 82. The blind Lamprey or Pride may be baited in the same way, and the three last-named baits should be always killed prior to placing them on the hook. In Cornwall the blind Lamprey or Pride is very much used as a whiffing bait for Pollack, and in baiting it, the point of the hook is brought out through the back, instead of through the belly, and only sufficiently far down to allow of the mouth covering the flattened top of the hook. The mouth is then tied round with thread

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