But before I proceed farther, I am to tell you, that there is a great antipathy betwixt the Pike and some frogs; and this may appear to the reader of Dubravius, a bishop in Bohemia,* who, in his book Of Fish and Fish-ponds, relates what he says he saw with his own eyes, and could not forbear to tell the reader; which was : "As he and the Bishop Thurzo were walking by a large pond in Bohemia, they saw a frog, when the Pike lay very sleepily and quiet by the shore side, leap upon his head; and the frog having expressed malice or anger by his swoln cheeks and staring eyes, did stretch out his legs and embraced the Pike's head, and presently reached them to his eyes, tearing, with them and his teeth, those tender parts: the Pike, moved with anguish, moves up and down the water, and rubs himself against weeds and whatever he thought might quit him of his enemy; but all in vain, for the frog did continue to ride triumphantly, and to bite and torment the Pike till his strength failed; and then the frog sunk with the Pike to the bottom of the water then presently the frog appeared again at the top, and croaked, and seemed to rejoice like a conqueror, after which he presently retired to his secret hole. The bishop, that had beheld the battle, called his fisherman to fetch his nets, and by all means to get the Pike, that they might declare what had happened and the Pike was drawn forth, and both his eyes eaten out, at which when they began to wonder, the fisherman wished them to forbear, and assured them he was certain that Pikes were often so served." I told this, which is to be read in the sixth chapter of the [first] book of Dubravius, unto a friend, who replied, "It was as improbable as to have the mouse scratch out the cat's eyes." But he did not consider, that there be fishing frogs, which the Dalmatians call the Water-devil, of which I might tell you as wonderful a story: but I shall tell you that it is not to be doubted but that there be some frogs so fearful of the water snake, that when they swim in a place in which they fear to meet with him, they then get a reed across into their mouths; which, if they two meet by accident, secures the frog from the strength and malice of the snake; and note, that the frog usually swims the fastest of the two. And let me tell you, that as there be water and land frogs, * Janus Dubravius Scala, bishop of Olmutz, in Moravia, in the sixteenth century, was born at Pilsen, in Bohemia. His book On Fish and Fishponds, in which are many pleasant relations, was, in 1599, translated into English, and published in quarto, by George Churchey, fellow of Lion's Inn, with the title of A new Book of good Husbandry, very Pleasant and of great Profit both for Gentlemen and Yeomen, containing the Order and Manner of Making of Fish-ponds, &c. : so there be land and water snakes.* Concerning which, take 'this observation, that the land snake breeds and hatches her eggs, which become young snakes, in some old dunghill, or a like hot place but the water snake, which is not venomous, and, as I have been assured by a great observer of such secrets, does not hatch, but breed her young alive, which she does not then forsake, but bides with them, and in case of danger will take them all into her mouth and swim away from any apprehended danger, and then let them out again when she thinks all danger to be passed: these be accidents that we anglers sometimes see, and often talk of. But whither am I going? I had almost lost myself, by remembering the discourse of Dubravius. I will therefore stop here; and tell you, according to my promise, how to catch the Pike. His feeding is usually of fish or frogs; and sometimes a weed of his own, called pickerel-weed, of which I told you some think Pikes are bred; for they have observed, that where none have been put into ponds, yet they have there found many; and that there has been plenty of that weed in those ponds, and [they think] that that weed both breeds and feeds them: but whether those Pikes so bred will ever breed by generation as the others do, I shall leave to the disquisitions of men of more curiosity and leisure than I profess myself to have; † and shall proceed to tell you, that you may fish for a Pike, either with a ledger or a walking bait; and you are to note, that I call that a ledger bait, which is fixed or made to rest in one certain place when you shall be absent from it; and I call that a walking bait, which you take with you, and have ever in motion. Concerning which two, I shall give you this direction; that your ledger bait is best to be a living bait, (though a dead one may catch,) whether it be a fish or a frog: and that you may make them live the longer, you may, or indeed you must take this course: First, for your live bait of fish, a Roach or Dace is, I think, best and most tempting, and a Perch is the longest lived on a hook; and, having cut off his fin on his back, which may be done without hurting him, you must take your knife, which cannot be too sharp, and betwixt the head and the fin on the back cut or make an incision, or such a scar as you may put the arming wire of your hook into it, with as little bruising or hurting the fish as art and diligence will enable you to do; *This is a gross mistake. It may as correctly be maintained that there are land and water ducks, or land and air skylarks.-J. R. We should not infer, that because we see the house spider, for the most part, in the cobweb, it was generated by the cobweb, though this reasoning would be as good as the one in the text. It is the same loose kind of observation that ascribes the production of insects to blighting winds.-J. R, and so carrying your arming wire along his back, unto or near the tail of your fish, betwixt the skin and the body of it, draw out that wire or arming of your hook at another scar near to his tail then tie him about it with thread, but no harder than of necessity to prevent hurting the fish; and the better to avoid hurting the fish, some have a kind of probe to open the way for the more easy entrance and passage of your wire or arming: but as for these, time and a little experience will teach you better than I can by words. Therefore I will for the present say no more of this; but come next to give you some directions how to bait your hook with a Frog. Venator. But, good master, did you not say even now, that some frogs were venomous; and is it not dangerous to touch them ? Piscator. Yes, but I will give you some rules or cautions concerning them. And first you are to note, that there are two kinds of frogs, that is to say, if I may so express myself, a flesh and a fish frog.* By flesh frogs, I mean frogs that breed and live on the land; and of these there be several sorts also, and of several colours, some being speckled, some greenish, some blackish or brown: the Green Frog, which is a small one, is by Topsel taken to be venomous and the Paddock, or Frog-paddock, which usually keeps or breeds on the land, and is very large and bony and big, especially the she frog of that kind; yet these will sometimes come into the water, but it is not often: and the land frogs are some of them observed by him to breed by laying eggs, and others to breed of the slime and dust of the earth, and that in winter they turn to slime again, and that the next summer that very slime returns to be a living creature; this is the opinion of Pliny. And Cardanus† undertakes to give a reason for the raining of frogst but if it were in my power, it should rain none but water frogs; for those, I think, are not venomous, especially the right water frog, which, about February or March, breeds in ditches, by slime, and blackish eggs in that slime: about which time of breeding, the he and she frogs are observed to use divers summersaults, and to croak and make a noise, which the land frog or paddock frog never does. Now, of these water frogs, if you intend to fish with a frog for a Pike, you are to choose the yellowest that you can get, for The whole of this paragraph is full of gross error. There are, indeed, two species of English Frogs, the Common and the Natterjack, but it does not appear that Walton knew the latter. —J. R. + In his 19 book, De Subtil ex. There are many well attested accounts of the raining of frogs; but Mr Ray rejects them as utterly false and ridiculous; and demonstrates the impossibility of their production in any such manner. Wisdom of God in the Creation, 310. See also Derham's Physico-Theology, 244, and Pennant's Zoology, quarto, Lond. 1776, vol. iv. p. 10. that the Pike ever likes best. And thus use your frog, that he may continue long alive : : Put your hook into his mouth, which you may easily do from the middle of April till August; and then the frog's mouth grows up, and he continues so for at least six months without eating,but is sustained none but He whose name is Wonderful knows how I say, put your hook, I mean the arming wire, through his mouth, and out at his gills; and then with a fine needle and silk sew the upper part of his leg, with only one stitch, to the arming wire of your hook; or tie the frog's leg above the upper joint to the armed wire; and, in so doing, use him as though you loved him, that is, harm him as little as you may possible that he may live the longer.* And now, having given you this direction for the baiting your ledger hook with a live fish or frog, my next must be to tell you how your hook, thus baited, must or may be used; and it is thus having fastened your hook to a line, which, if it be not fourteen yards long, should not be less than twelve, you are to fasten that line to any bough near to a hole where a Pike is, or is likely to lie, or to have a haunt: and then wind your line on any forked stick, all your line except half a yard of it or rather more; and split that forked stick, with such a nick, or notch, at one end of it as may keep the line from any more of it ravelling from about the stick than so much of it as you intend. And choose your forked stick to be of that bigness as may keep the fish or frog from pulling the forked stick under the water till the Pike bites; and then the Pike having pulled the line forth of the cleft or nick of that stick in which it was gently fastened, he will have line enough to go to his hold and pouch the bait. And if you would have this ledger bait to keep at a fixed place, undisturbed by wind or other accidents which may drive it to the shore side (for you are to note, that it is likeliest to catch a Pike in the midst of the water,) then hang a small plummet of lead, a stone, or piece of tile, or a turf, in a string, and cast into the water with the forked stick to hang upon the ground, to be a kind of anchor to keep the forked stick from moving out of your intended place till the Pike come: this I take to be a very good way to use so many ledger baits, as you intend to make trial of. Or if you bait your hooks thus with live fish or frogs, and in a windy day, fasten them thus to a bough or bundle of straw, and by the help of that wind can get them to move across a pond or mere, you are like to stand still on the shore and see sport presently, if there be any store of Pikes. Or these live baits It is upon this that Lord Byron founds his charge of cruelty against Walton, not altogether, I must confess, without plausible reason.-J. R. may make sport, being tied about the body or wings of a goose or duck, and she chased over a pond.* And the like may be done with turning three or four live baits thus fastened to bladders, or boughs, or bottles of hay or flags, to swim down a river, whilst you walk quietly alone on the shore, and are still in expectation of sport. The rest must be taught you by practice; for time will not allow me to say more of this kind of fishing with live baits. And for your dead bait for a Pike : for that you may be taught by one day's going a-fishing with me, or any other body that fishes for him; for the baiting your hook with a dead Gudgeon or a Roach, and moving it up and down the water, is too easy a thing to take up any time to direct you to do it. And yet because I cut you short in that, I will commute for it by telling you that that was told me for a secret-it is this: Dissolve gum of ivy in oil of spike, and therewith anoint your dead bait for a Pike: and then cast it in a likely place; and when it has lain a short time at the bottom, draw it towards the top of the water, and so up the stream: and it is more than likely that you have a Pike follow with more than common eagerness. And some affirm, that any bait anointed with the marrow of the thigh bone of a hern is a great temptation to any fish.† These have not been tried by me, but told me by a friend of note, that pretended to do me a courtesy. But if this direc A rod twelve feet long, and a ring of wire, In killing a Pike; but the forked stick, With a slit and a bladder, and that other fine trick, The gentry of Shropshire do merrily smile, To see a goose and a belt the fish to beguile. When a Pike suns himself, and a frogging doth go, The two inched hook is better, I know, Than the ordinary snaring. But still I must cry, "When the Pike is at home, mind the cookery." BARKER'S Art of Angling. + If this be so, it must arise, I think, from its fishy smell giving token of a goodly morsel of food, the undoubted cause of Salmon roe being so good a bait J. R. The Pike loves a still, shady, unfrequented water, and usually lies amongst or near weeds; such as flags, bulrushes, candocks, reeds, or in the green fog that sometimes covers standing waters, though he will sometimes shoot out into the clear stream. He is sometimes caught at the top, and in the middle; and often, especially in cold weather, at the bottom. Their time of spawning is about the end of February or the beginning of March; and chief season, from the end of May to the beginning of February. Pikes are called Jacks till they become twenty-four inches long. The baits for Pike, besides those mentioned by Walton, are a small Trout; the Loach and Miller's-thumb; the head end of an Eel, with the skin taken off below the fins; a small Jack; a Lob-worm; and, in winter, the fat of bacon. And notwithstanding what Walton and others say |