FOREWORD 



To All My Good Friends of the Angle, Greeting: 



I come to you with another fishing book, not be- 

 cause of any particular fitness of myself for the task; 

 rather, because there is so much need for the work. 

 So far as I know, there is no American book dealing 

 exclusively with the pikes, a family, by the way, which 

 I think has not received its just due from the great 

 host of anglers and angling writers. Of course the 

 muskellunge has always been given an honorable place 

 among the fresh-water fish of the world, but I under- 

 take to prove that there is a place for even the despised 

 pickerel in the ichthyic scheme of things; furthermore, 

 that on suitable tackle he is a foeman worthy of any 

 angler's skill. But read the chapter 'The Little 

 Pickerels." The reader will find the subdivision "Fly- 

 Fishing for Pickerel" something of a revelation I am 

 sure. Right here I ask the reader's careful and charit- 

 able consideration of any new and original methods of 

 angling described or advocated. Do not judge hastily 

 or without some experimentation along the lines sug- 

 gested. In other words, do not *damn me without 

 something further than a hearing. 



Scientific diagnosis of species is gone into with some 

 care, for the matter of when a pike is a great pike or 

 muskellunge, and not a pickerel, is a question that is 

 asked over and over again. I think anyone can readily 

 see that a pike as a great pike is just as much of a 



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