The instruments consist of a needle and a mesh (see [Fig. 1]). From eight to ten inches is a good length for the needle, while the mesh stick must vary according to the size of the net you are about to make. A mesh stick will make a mesh twice its own size. Thus a stick half an inch square will make a one-inch mesh.
Any youth at all handy with a knife can manufacture these articles for himself, and there only remains to obtain the material. This must depend upon what is going to be made, for once the stitch is learned there is no more difficulty in making a large seine than in making an onion net or a network hammock.
Fig. 2.
Fig. 3.
The better plan is to go to the nearest string shop, and pick out what is suitable in size and strength as well as in price. When the material is purchased—white line, seine twine, or common twine, whatever it may be—if it is not already in a ball, wind it into one. Then find a hook, or place one just a convenient distance above you as you sit, to which to fasten the end of the twine. Now fill your needle, pass the twine round the tine, or inside point, round the heel of the needle, then up round the tine again, until the needle is full. Now fasten the end of the twine to the hook—a nail, if it be firm, will answer the same purpose—and tie a loop in it ([Fig. 2]). Then lay the mesh stick underneath the twine, and pass the needle up through the loop ([Fig. 3]). Then pull it tight, so that the end of the loop rests against the mesh stick ([Fig. 4]).
Fig. 4.
