. The gamekeeper at home : sketches of natural history and rural life . d the man was but afew minutes in accomplishing the feat. It sometimeshappens that after a heavy flood, when the brook hasbeen thick with suspended mud for several days, sosoon as it has gone down fish are more than usuallyplentiful, as if the flood had brought them up-stream :poachers are then particularly busy. Fresh fish—that is, those who are new to thatparticular part of the brook—are, the poachers say,much more easily captured than those who have madeit their home for some time. They are, in fact, moreeasily discover
. The gamekeeper at home : sketches of natural history and rural life . d the man was but afew minutes in accomplishing the feat. It sometimeshappens that after a heavy flood, when the brook hasbeen thick with suspended mud for several days, sosoon as it has gone down fish are more than usuallyplentiful, as if the flood had brought them up-stream :poachers are then particularly busy. Fresh fish—that is, those who are new to thatparticular part of the brook—are, the poachers say,much more easily captured than those who have madeit their home for some time. They are, in fact, moreeasily discovered ; they have not yet found out all thenooks and corners, the projecting roots and the hollowsunder the banks, the dark places where a black shadow Fishing by Hand 19. falls from overhanging trees and is with difficultypierced even by a practised eye. They exposethemselves in open places, and meet an untimelyfate. Besides pike, tench are occasionally wired, andnow and then even a large roach ; the tench, thougha bottom fish, in the shallow brooks maybe sometimes. ^^vS«^ L TICKLING TROUT detected by the eye, and is not a difficult fish tocapture. Everyone has heard of tickling trout: thetench is almost equally amenable to titillation. Lyingat full length on the sward, with his hat off lest it shouldfall into the water, the poacher peers down into the hole O 194 ^^^ Gamekeeper at Home where he has reason to think tench may be fish is so dark in colour when viewed from abovethat for a minute or two, till the sight adapts itself tothe dull light of the water, the poacher cannot dis-tinguish what he is searching for. Presently, havingmade out the position of the tench, he slips his baredarm in slowly, and without splash, and finds little orno trouble as a rule in getting his hand close to thefish without alarming it : tench, indeed, seem rathersluggish. He then passes his fingers under the bellyand gently rubs it. Now it would appear that he hasthe fish in his power
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Keywords: ., book, bookcentury1800, booksubjectcountrylife, booksubjecthunting
