160 BOOK OF THE BLACK BASS. 



Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, in connection with two pub- 

 lic-spirited gentlemen of Wheeling (Forsythe and Shriver), 

 brought from Wheeling Creek, West Virginia, a small lot 

 of Bass in the water-tank of his tender. They were placed 

 in the Potomac, near Cumberland, and from this stock, 

 the Potomac, for more than two hundred miles, and all its 

 large tributaries — the Seneca, Shenandoah, Cherry Creek, 

 Sleepy Creek, Great and Little Cacapon, Patterson's Creek, 

 South and North Branch, etc. — aiford fine fishing. 



" They are, I know, from the Great Falls to a consid- 

 erable distance west of Cumberland, for I have recently so 

 taken them, and often weighing from five to seven pounds 

 — from four to five pounds is not unusual. * * * " 



The Baltimore American in June, 1874, in an article on 

 Fish Culture, remarked incidentally : — 



"It was twenty years ago, that Alban G. Stabler and 

 J. P. Dukehart, together with Forsythe and Shriver, 

 brought a small lot of Black Bass in the tender of a loco- 

 motive from Wheeling Creek, West Virginia, and put 

 them in the Potomac. From this small beginning, sprang 

 the noble race of fish which now swarm in the river." 



It is certain from the above evidence, that General 

 Shriver was the leading spirit in the enterprise, assisted, 

 no doubt, by Mr. Forsythe, of Wheeling, and Mr. A. G. 

 Stabler, of Baltimore. The latter g'entleman, being the 

 conductor of the train which carried the Bass — and there 

 is no evidence showing that more than one lot was taken — 

 certainly had some share in the transaction ; and if he was 

 a "chip off the old block" — for his father, above-men- 

 tioned, was an enthusiastic angler — it would naturally be 

 expected that he would have taken a lively interest in the 

 aifair. 



