Fishing from the earliest times - Blog

^456 CHINESE FISHING500 B.C. took the place of our modern float : the moment theAngler " saw it sink, he knew a fish was on." 1In the first century before and after the Christian era thegerm of Imperial ostentation and extravagance in tackle ragedvirulently. Spreading, if not from China to Peru, at any ratelike silk 2 from China to Rome, it claimed among its victimsthe Emperor Nero and the Emperor Wu of the Han dynasty.The bacillus found the better host in Nero, who ^ fished withgolden nets drawn by purple ropes,while his brother of Asiaconfined himself to angling from a boat with a hook of puregold, a line of white silk, and red carp for a lure.*But the commonality of one State, at any rate, ran no badsecond to the Imperial pair. " The people of Lu," we read," were fond of fishing : they used cinnamon bark for bait,forged gold for hooks, which were variegated with silver orgreen colours, while their fishing line was ornamented withthe feathers of the turquoise kingfisher." ^ Here perhaps, asthe bird fives on fish, we can detect a conscious or unconscioustouch of homoeopathic magic.Lures such as the natural or artificial fly obtain no record :even now the Chinese and Japanese try most things before anartificial fly. The baits consisted of worms, grain, fish, meat,and cassia. The latter aromatic herb recalls the anglers ofOppian and Pliny, who beheved in the attraction of fish bythe sense of smell.In their unusual baits our authors suggest their confreresof Greece and Rome. Thus in size of prey, and similarity ofbait, the author of the K'ung ts'ung tzii and Herodotus1 Apud Werner, op. cit., 277.2 In 325 B.C. Chinese silks were sold in Greek markets (Werner, op. cit..Table III.), while by the first century B.C. there was a brisk trade in them withRome, through Parthia. Cf. Pliny, N. H., XXIV. 8, and XXXIV. 41 ; Virgil,Georg., II. 121 ; Horace, Epod, VIII. 15 ; Mela, III. 7 ". . . pretiosis vestibusin omnes terrae partes mittere solebant," and Seneca's protest Ep. 90, "possenos vestitos esse sine commercio Serico. Pliny, XII. 41, estimates that forluxuries from China, India, and Arabia, Rome was paying annually over100,000,000 sesterces.3 Eutropius, VII. 14.* Han Wu Ku Shih, apud Werner, op. cit., p. 278. Imperial hunting andfishing expeditions are described on the stone drums of the Chou Dynastyc. 750 B.C. now at Peking. See Journal N.-C, R.B.A.S., N.S., VIII. 146-152.* Ch'iieh Tzil, apud Werner, p. 276.* Antea, p. 2j8.