The FIFTH day-continued Of Roack and Dace Venator and PiscatorVenator.Good master, as we go now towards London, be still so courteous as to give me more instructions; for I have several boxes in my memory, in which I will keep them all very safe, there shall not one of them be lost.
Piscator.Well, scholar, that I will: and I will hide nothing from you that I can remember, and can think may help you forward towards a perfection in this art.And because we have so much time, and I have said so little of Roach and Dace, I will give you some directions concerning them.
Some say the Roach is so called from rutilus, which they say signifies red fins.He is a fish of no great reputation for his dainty taste; and his spawn is accounted much better than any other part of him.And you may take notice, that as the Carp is accounted the water-fox, for his cunning; so the Roach is accounted the water-sheep, for his simplicity or foolishness.It is noted, that the Roach and Dace recover strength, and grow in season in a fortnight after spawning; the Barbel and Chub in a month; the Trout in four months; and the Salmon in the like time, if he gets into the sea, and after into fresh water.
Roaches be accounted much better in the river than in a pond, though ponds usually breed the biggest.But there is a kind of bastard small Roach, that breeds in ponds, with a very forked tail, and of a very small size; which some say is bred by the Bream and right Roach; and some ponds are stored with these beyond belief; and knowing-men, that know their difference, call them Ruds: they differ from the true Roach, as much as a Herring from a Pilchard.And these bastard breed of Roach are now scattered in many rivers: but I think not in the Thames, which Ibelieve affords the largest and fattest in this nation, especially below London Bridge.The Roach is a leather-mouthed fish, and has a kind of saw-like teeth in his throat.And lastly, let me tell you, the Roach makes an angler excellent sport, especially the great Roaches about London, where I think there be the best Roach-anglers.And I think the best Trout-anglers be in Derbyshire; for the waters there are clear to an extremity.
Next, let me tell you, you shall fish for this Roach in Winter, with paste or gentles; in April, with worms or cadis; in the very hot months, with little white snails; or with flies under water, for he seldom takes them at the top, though the Dace will.In many of the hot months, Roaches may also be caught thus: take a May-fly, or ant-fly, sink him with a little lead to the bottom, near to the piles or posts of a bridge, or near to any posts of a weir, I mean any deep place where Roaches lie quietly, and then pull your fly up very leisurely, and usually a Roach will follow your bait up to the very top of the water, and gaze on it there, and run at it, and take it, lest the fly should fly away from him.
I have seen this done at Windsor and Henley Bridge, and great store of Roach taken; and sometimes, a Dace or Chub.And in August you may fish for them with a paste made only of the crumbs of bread, which should be of pure fine manchet; and that paste must be so tempered betwixt your hands till it be both soft and tough too: a very little water, and time, and labour, and clean hands, will make it a most excellent paste.But when you fish with it, you must have a small hook, a quick eye, and a nimble hand, or the bait is lost, and the fish too; if one may lose that which he never had.With this paste you may, as I said, take both the Roach and the Dace or Dare; for they be much of a kind, in manner of feeding, cunning, goodness, and usually in size.And therefore take this general direction, for some other baits which may concern you to take notice of: they will bite almost at any fly, but especially at ant-flies; concerning which take this direction, for it is very good.
Take the blackish ant-fly out of the mole-hill or ant-hill, in which place you shall find them in the month of June; or if that be too early in the year, then, doubtless, you may find them in July, August, and most of September.Gather them alive, with both their wings: and then put them into a glass that will hold a quart or a pottle; but first put into the glass a handful, or more, of the moist earth out of which you gather them, and as much of the roots of the grass of the said hillock; and then put in the flies gently, that they lose not their wings: lay a clod of earth over it;and then so many as are put into the glass, without bruising, will live there a month or more, and be always in readiness for you to fish with:
but if you would have them keep longer, then get any great earthen pot, or barrel of three or four gallons.which is better.then wash your barrel with water and honey; and having put into it a quantity of earth and grass roots, then put in your flies, and cover it, and they will live a quarter of a year.These, in any stream and clear water, are a deadly bait for Roach or Dace, or for a Chub: and your rule is to fish not less than a handful from the bottom.