“An Istrian fisherman drives a pair of oxen near the river-bank, not, however, for the purpose of ploughing.... If a pair of horses are at hand, the fisherman makes use of horses; and with the yoke on his shoulders, down he goes and takes his station at a spot which he thinks will make a convenient seat for himself, and be a good place for sport. He fastens one end of the fishing-rope, which is stout and capable of standing a good tug, to the middle of the yoke, and supplies the oxen, or the horses, as the case may be, with sufficient food, and the animals take their fill. “To the other end of the rope he fastens a strong and terribly sharp hook, baited with the lungs of a wild bull; this he throws into the water as a lure—a very sweet lure—to the Istrian _silurus_, having previously fastened a piece of lead of sufficient size to the rope above the place where the hook is bound on, to serve as a support for the pull.[584] “When the fish perceives the bait of bull’s-flesh, he immediately rushes at the prey, and, meeting with that he so dearly loves, opens wide his great jaws and greedily swallows the dreadful bait; then the glutton, at first turning himself round with pleasure, soon finds that he has been pierced unawares with the aforesaid hook, and being eager to escape from the calamity shakes the rope with the greatest violence. “The fisherman observes this, and is filled with delight; he jumps from his seat, and, now in the character of a fisherman, now in that of a ploughman, like an actor who changes his mask in a play, he urges on his oxen or horses, and a mighty contest takes place between the monster and the yoked animals; for the creature, foster-child of the Ister, draws downward with all his might, while the yoked animals pull the rope in an opposite direction. The fish can make no headway. Beaten by the united efforts of the team, he gives in, and is hauled on to the bank.” _Siluri_, according to common report, have been caught weighing over 400 lbs. and of more than twelve feet in length. There is good ground for us moderns patting ourselves on the back, when we realise that owing to the many improvements effected in our tackle, and not least in the Rod, an angler off Catalina has often landed a heavier fish than a yoke of oxen on the banks of the Ister, _e.g._ Mr. A. N. Howard (in 1916) caught the record Black Sea Bass in Californian waters, weighing 493 lbs. Even this big fellow is quite a dwarf beside the Tuna of 710 lbs. taken in Canadian waters by Mr. Laurence Mitchell,[585] which still holds, I believe, the record of the world as the very largest fish ever taken on a rod.