and himself one of our keenest fishermen, tells me that he, several years ago, assisted his father to land a male trout of 7lb. weight, from the watermill pool at Horncastle. It fought so hard that he and his brother had to rush into the water and take it in their arms, their father’s tackle not being intended for such a monster. [80a] This, however, was surpassed by a trout taken by the late Mr. Robert Clitherow, of Horncastle, a beau ideal disciple of the gentle craft, which weighed 8lbs.
Probably the handsomest trout in the neighbourhood, though not the largest, are those of the Somersby “beck,” “The Brook,” rendered for ever classical by the sweet poem of the late Poet Laureate. In years gone by the writer has enjoyed many a picnic on its banks, when we used to pull off our shoes and stockings, and turn up our trousers—gentlemen as well as boys—to catch the trout by the process called “tickling” them, while hiding in their holes; which the ladies afterwards cooked on a fire extemporised on the bank. The music of the rippling stream haunts one still, as one reads those liquid lines of the poet, themselves almost a runnel:
I chatter over stony ways,
In little sharps and trebles;
I bubble into eddying bays,
I babble on the pebbles. [80b]
Twenty-five or thirty years ago, the dykes in the Fens, near the Witham, abounded in fish of the coarser kinds, with some goodly pike among them. As a boy the writer has caught many a pike by the process called “sniggling,” i.e., a noose of wire, or gimp, attached to the end of a stiff rod, or stick, which is deftly slipt over a fish’s head, as he basks among the water weeds, and, when thus snared, he is jerked ashore. When shooting in the Fens he has also killed, at one shot, five or six fish crowded together in a dyke. But climatic alterations, and over-perfect drainage, have changed all this. The water now runs out to sea so rapidly that the
Fen drains are dry for a great part of the year, and the fish are no more.
Enough has now been said to show that the visitor to Woodhall Spa, who has a taste for “the contemplative man’s recreation,” [81] may find some employment in its vicinity. Most of the ponds can be fished on asking the farmers’ permission. As to the Witham, although there are angling clubs at Boston and Lincoln, the river is practically open to every one, in the season. It may be added that close to Tattershall station there is a large “ballast pond” containing good pike, and a letter to the shooting tenant, or to Lord Fortescue’s agent, would probably obtain permission to fish. At Revesby there is a reservoir, the source of the water supply of Boston, a large piece of water, which abounds in fish of various kinds. Bream, both of the silver and the carp kinds, are plentiful, running up to 4lb. in weight. Very large eels are taken there. Roach are of a fair size. Rudd are numerous; as also are perch, but small. Gudgeons are plentiful, serving for bait. Pike are abundant. In one case three were taken by the same rod within twenty minutes, one of them weighing 13lb. Another rod took two of 16lb. and 10lb., and it is commonly said that there is one occasionally seen “as long as a rail.” Permission may be obtained to fish here from the agent of the Hon. Mrs. Stanhope, Revesby Abbey. There is good accommodation at the Red Lion Hotel.
As, in the next chapter, I am to enter upon a different branch of my subject, passing roughly speaking, from the organic to inorganic—from the living to the dead—I will here give a few particulars, recently received, which may interest the entomologist. In the month of August, 1898, I conducted the members of our county Naturalists’ Union from Woodhall Spa
to Tumby, through a varied tract of country. The following is a list of the Lepidoptera which were found by one of the members:—
| Pieris brassicæ | E. hyperanthus |
| P. rapæ | Thecla quercus |
| P. napi | Polyommatus phlœas |
| Colias edusa | Lycœna icarus |
| Argynnis aglaia | Hesperia thaumas |
| A. paphia | Spilosoma mendica (two larvæ) |
| Vanessa io | |
| V. atalanta | Psilura monacha |
| Apatura iris | Plusia gamma |
| Pararge megæra | Geometra papilionaria |
| Epinephele janira | Cidaria immanata |
| E. tithonus | Eubolia limitata |
Two other members collected the following:—