Trolling is practiced from a moving boat, either with handline and spoon, or with rod and reel, with minnow, small spoon, or artificial flies. Trolling with the hand-line can hardly be reckoned within the pale of legitimate angling; sometimes, as in camping, it is practiced as a matter of necessity rather than as a phase of sportmanship.

Trolling with light and suitable rod and tackle, and a small spoon, a minnow, or artificial Hies of large size, is a higher grade of angling than still-fishing, and is productive of the keenest enjoyment and pleasure. Many anglers prefer it to all other methods, as there is the variety of the slowly moving boat, the ever-changing scene, and the fierce rush of the Bass when he seizes the moving lure-for he always hooks himself (if hooked at all) in this style of fishing.

Trolling with the rod is usually more successful than still-fishing, on lakes and large ponds, as the angler covers more ground, and the bait is in constant motion, and moves in a more natural manner. The angler also has opportunities to indulge more in hope and anticipation than in still-fishing, and requires less patience and perseverance and pertinacity.

But in all the methods of angling, from fly-fishing to still-fishing (excepting always the murderous hand-line and spoon) perhaps comparisons are indeed odious; for all methods have their votaries, each as enthusiastic as the other, and each, no doubt, getting as much pleasure and enjoyment out of his own method as the other in his; and, moreover, all are alike members of the universal angling guild, and however different their modes and methods, one and all can say of "angling," as did Sir Henry Wotton (who died in 1601, aged ninety-five years), that it was "a rest to his mind, a cheerer of his spirits, a diverter of sadness, a calmer of unquiet thoughts, a moderator of passions, a procurer of contentedness;" that "it begat habits of peace and patience in those that professed and practiced it."

By Dr. James A. Henshall.