directions, sometimes across, at others up or down the water, drawing the bait towards you, and playing with a similar motion as in spinning a Minnow; try not long in one spot; when a fish bites, slacken the line, and give time before striking: this often succeeds in bad weather, when all other methods fail, but more especially in a rough southerly or westerly wind.

If the Angler roves with a Minnow, let it be alive, (and by putting them as soon as caught into his Minnow-kettle, and placing them in the stream, they are easily preserved,) and the hook stuck in under the back fin, or through the upper lip; let the Minnow swim in mid-water, or rather lower; use a cork float of a size that he cannot sink it under water, with a few shot, about nine inches from the hook, to keep him down, or, when tired, he will rise to the Surface. When using the Frog, put the hook through the skin of its back, and it will swim easier than if the hook was thrust through the skin of its hind legs; recollect to keep this bait as far from the Shore as possible, for he will constantly be making to it always give line enough at a bite, to let the Perch gorge. May and June are the best months, as the Perch are then prowling in search of the young fry of Dace, Roach, and other fish. Where Pike are suspected to haunt, the hook should be fixed to gimp; as, in this way of fishing, they will take the bait as well as the Perch.

Some use Minnows, as in the dead Snap for Pike, with three fine gut twisted together, or a piece of small gimp, to which the hook is tied; the baiting

needle must be shorter, the wire of it small, and the Minnow exactly baited as a Dace for Pike. By this mode there is a greater certainty of hooking the fish, as all fish of prey seize their food by the middle : when the hooks are thus placed, they are more sure than the common method with a large hook, and a smaller above it; the way of using the latter is, to a hook, No. 3, tie a link of gut, or fine gimp, at about three quarters of an inch above it; tie a hook, No. 9, (there are small ones called lip-hooks, adapted to this sole purpose of keeping the Minnow in a proper position,) join this link, which should be eight inches long, to another, by a small Swivel closed at both ends, fastening a small lead weight (shaped like that directed to be used in the dead snap for Pike) about an inch above the swivel; these swivels are to be fastened to the links with fine double silk well waxed, and the end of the upper link formed into a noose, (secured also with waxed silk,) to fix it to the line; the point of the large hook is to be put in at the shoulder of the Minnow, and down as far as the bend of the hook will permit, bringing the point out so that the tail may be a little curved with the bend of the hook, which will cause it to spin better: fasten the head with a small hook, by running it through the middle of the bottom, and out at the top of the upper jaw. The only recommendation to this plan, is the readiness of baiting the Minnow; the other being unquestionably the best for hooking the fish which bite at it.

Other baits for the Perch are Loaches, Sticklebacks, with the spines cut off, Miller's Thumbs, Horse

beans boiled (after the place has been well baited with them, put one at a time on the hook,) Cat-bait, Bobs, and Gentles.

Although generally termed a bold Biter, the Perch is extremely abstemious in Winter, and scarcely ever bites at that Season, but in the middle of a warm Sun-shiny day: he bites best in the latter part of the Spring, from seven to eleven in the forenoon, and from two to six in the afternoon, except in hot and bright weather, and then from Sun-rise to six in the morning, and in the Eve from six to Sun-set. If a day be cool and cloudy, with a ruffling south wind, Perch will bite during the whole of it. In clear water, sometimes a dozen or more of Perch have been observed in a deep hole, sheltered by trees or bushes; by using fine tackle, and a well scoured worm,the Angler may see them strive which shall first seize it, until the whole Shoal have been caught. The Perch may be angled for and taken until the end of September, and indeed at particular times all the Year round; but the preferable Season is from the beginning of May to the middle of July.

In a lake called Llyn Raithlyn, in Merionethshire, is a very singular Variety of Perch, (of which an engraving is given ;) the lower part of the back bone, next the tail, is strangely distorted; in colour, and in other respects, it resembles the common kind, which are as numerous in the lake as these deformed fish; of which latter some have been taken of nearly two pounds weight. They are not, says Mr. PenNANT, peculiar to this water, for LINNEUS notices a similar Variety found in small lakes near Fahlun,

in his own Country; and Mr. P. also heard it was to be met with in the Thames, near Marlow. In Sweden, the country people imagined this alteration in the shape of the Perch to be occasioned by the quality of the water in those lakes, being impregnated with some mineral salt, especially as they are situated near the largest Copper mine in Europe; but there is no Copper mine near Llyn Raithlyn or the river Eynion, where Trout are found crooked in the same manner as the Perch, although from the taper make of the former, the Curve does not appear so strongly as in the latter.

The Honourable DAINES BARRINGTON, in a letter to Doctor WATSON, remarks, that these fish in Llyn Raithlyn, (of which he had received specimens, as he desired, very small, for the convenience of preserving them in Spirits,) were not only crooked near the tail, but for about one third of the whole length of their body; and had likewise a very remarkable protuberance on each side, which he had opened with a knife, but it did not materially differ from other parts of flesh, and when dressed, there was nothing in the taste to distinguish them from the common Perch.

In the summer of 1801, the Compiler caught some Perch in PERRY's Dock at Blackwall; upon opening them, a lining of solid fat was taken out, (lying on each side, without adhering to the Ribs,) that weighed in the heaviest, three ounces and a half; the Stomach was completely closed, and appeared, from its thickness, not to have been distended by food for some time: both the Fat and the Stomach were

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shewn to many Fishmongers, Tackle-makers, and others, who were or had been in the habits of seeing this species of fish at all Seasons, and from vari ous parts of England; but they unanimously agreed, that they never met with any circumstance at all similar. The Perch weighed from two to two pounds and a half.

At Malham Water, not far from Settle in Yorkshire, the Perch grow to five pounds weight and upwards; and this remarkable circumstance attends them, that these large fish are all blind of one or both Eyes.

Perch will strike a Flew Net freely; the rougher the Wind, if from the South or West, the more they range in quest of food: in a North or East wind they stir as little as possible from their holds: Success with either Net or Line is not to be fairly expected with the Wind from these Quarters.

Carp

is one of the naturalized fish of this country, being supposed to have been brought by LEONARD MASCAL, a Sussex Gentleman, (in which county, perhaps, this fish abounds more than in any other,) about the year 1514; and it is remarked in an old distich, enumerating the good things of which this Island was destitute, prior to this period, that

"Turkies, Carps, Hops, Pickerell, and Beer,
Came into England all in one year."

This, however, is erroneous, for in the Boke of St.