CARP.
It is a very difficult matter to catch Carp with the bait, as they are most cunning fish to detect at once the deception, and swim away on the least sight of the rod or the shadow of the fisherman. The Carp haunt the deep parts of gently running streams, and those caught in rivers are the best; those that are very numerous in ponds are lean and soft in the flesh, and rather insipid. The best plan to angle for them would be with a very fine gut line, a No. 9 hook, baited with a couple of small red worms or two gentles, thrown into the water where they are, very cautiously, and keep well out of sight. Let the bait sink a short way from the surface, and draw it gently towards you, using at the same time a very long rod, rather stiff. Strike immediately they take the bait, gently, and play them as you would a trout on the fly.
CHUB.
The Chub is rather a handsome fish when in season, and those caught with the artificial fly in many parts of the Thames, are very brilliant and pretty to look at; but, unfortunately, they are full of very small bones, when cooked the roe is wholesome.
They haunt the deepest pools and rivers under shaded banks overhung with trees, the sides of weirs, and in ponds where a small spring runs in and out of them, with rather a rocky or gravelly bottom. Autumn is the best season for them, although I have caught them with the fly in the Thames in summer in good perfection, when fishing for trout. The way to angle for them would be to use a quill float, with a No. 8 hook, or larger, a gut line, and some shot about ten inches from the bait to sink the float, bait the hook with bread paste made red, and made tough in clean hands, put on a piece of it the size of a nut, throw in gently, and keep out of sight. Good cheese, well worked to make it tough, is also good. They will take gentles turned inside out on the hook one over the other, and when you have a bite strike rather quickly. They will also take grasshoppers, blue bottles, cadbait, and cockchafers; and with red or yellow flies, and black and brown palmers in the ordinary way of fishing for trout.
GUDGEONS AND MINNOWS.
These are very beautiful little fish, and most wholesome food; they are the best bait for perch, jack, and large trout, that can be, as I mentioned before. The way to angle for them is to have a couple of very small hooks tied on hair or fine gut, with a shot or two to carry the float off the bottom, say a small quill float, bait your hook with a very small red worm, or a piece of a brandling worm; they may be seen very numerous in the Thames, along the sides of streams, and in smooth running water with gravelly bottom; they afford nice amusement to the young angler, and when taken out of the water are remarkably handsome to look at.