a bladder and leather, and it will keep two years. When you want to use it, put some into a small taper pewter box, and anoint your bait with it, and about eight or nine inches of the line, and when it is washed off, repeat the unction. Proba tum est. "All arts and shapes, the wily angler tries, "To cloak his fraud, and tempt the finny prize : 66 Pastes, oils, and unguents, of each scent and hue." HOW TO MAKE FISH-HOOKS. In order to make a good hook, there are requisite a hammer, a knife, a pair of pincers, an iron semi-cleam, a file, a wrest, a bender, tongs, both long and short, an anvil, and steel needles of different sizes. Heat a needle of the size you want, in a charcoal fire, and raise the beard with your knife, then let it cool. Sharpen the point, either with a file or on a grindstone, then put it into the fire again and bend it into what shape you please; make the upper part of the shank four square, and file the edges smooth, then put it into the fire a third time, and heat it gently; take it out suddenly, and plunge it into water, and your operation is finished. Use not a small hook for great baits, nor a large one for small ones :-Barbels and chubs must have large ones, but perches, tenches, breams, and eels, much smaller. Trouts in clear waters, graylings, salmon-smelts, roach and dace, ruffs and gudgeons, must have small hooks: and, though many angle for trouts with large hooks in thick waters, yet small ones are the best. Experience will point out the inconvenience of large hooks-The noble salmon alone must have a large one. A GLUE FOr angling-rods. Pour some water on some quick lime, until the ebullition ceases, then pour the water from it, and boil your glue very gently with this water, and it will make a very good glue. A RECEIPT THAT RENDERS LEATHER MORE CAPABLE TO KEEP OUT WET. As dry feet are very necessary to health, I have copied an excellent receipt for the angler's use, that will prevent his boots or shoes letting in water. Take a pint of linseed oil, with half a pound of mutton suet, six or eight ounces of bees wax, and a halfpenny worth of rosin; boil all these in a pipkin together, and then let it cool till it be lukewarm; take a little hair brush, and lay it on your boots; but it is much better to be laid on the leather before the boots are made, and brushed with it once over when they are; as for your old boots or shoes, you must brush them with it when they are dry. As I am now acting the part of physician, let me advise you, whenever you are out in the heat of summer, fishing, and are thirsty, never to drink water, as the consequences arising from such an indiscretion may prove faal; but either take a little brandy or rum out with you, in a wicker bottle, or wait till you come o some house where you can have a little; the ffects it has of quenching the thirst, and cooling he body are instantaneous. The angler being now furnished with every re quisite for the art of ground angling, his strictly adhering to the theory laid down, in his practice, is the only thing he has to do, and he may depend on his endeavours being crowned with success. The second part of this little essay will treat of artificial fly-fishing, under every head that can prove of utility to the angler; which certainly bears the bell in that delightful recreation, that adds strength and vigour to the body, keeps the mind in a perfect state of serenity, and tranquillity, and alleviates the cares and troubles attendanc on mortality. In short, how delightful is every species of this diversion, in such a paradise as the Poet describes: Behind, where alders from the weather screen, END OF THE FIRST PART. PART II. THE COMPLETE FLY-FISHER; OR EVERY MAN HIS OWN FLY-MAKER. With pliant rod athwart the pebbled brook, And with a fur-wrought fly delude the prey. All the gay hues that wait on female pride. GAY. |