FisJi and FisJiino:; in America. 



227 



larh' when the fish is the first of its 

 species that has fallen to his rod. With 

 this fadt before me, I am impelled to 

 question the accuracy of the recorded 

 northern range of the bonefish. 



But little is known of the angling- 

 traits of A. viilpcs, although for several 

 years past there has been great interest 

 shown by anglers, in Florida, as to its 

 fighting qualities and habitat. In the 

 winter of '94-'95, a large number of 

 enthusiastic anglers gathered at Naples, 

 on the Gulf of Mexico, and none of 

 them had any personal knowledge of 

 this much-talked-about fish. It seems 

 to have fallen to the good fortune of 

 an intelligent and observant, but anony- 

 .mous writer, to herald its .superiority 

 as a game fish. He wrote: 



' ' For the past two winters, skillful 

 fishermen among the Northern to;irists, 

 whom I knew personally or by reputa- 

 tion among mutual acquaintances, have 

 been reporting with enthusiasm the 

 discovery in Biscayne Bay of a new 

 game-fish which is to surpass all the 

 other ministers to piscatorial amuse- 

 ments. Some went so far as to say 

 that the tarpon is superseded as the 

 king of fish; as expressed by one of 

 them, who kills annually more than 

 fifty tarpon, ' the tarpon is not in it. ' 



' ' Being inflamed by this story of the 

 ' new planet which swims within our 

 ken,' I took a day at Biscayne Bay, 

 returning to-night with three of the 

 fish. 



"The bonefish is new to me, and so 

 far as I can ascertain, is taken only in 

 Florida, at Biscayne Bay, and probably 

 southward, though as to this I have no 

 information. A guide did tell me that 

 it is abundant in Cuba, where it is 

 called what he pronounced leetha, or 

 ' the swift. ' 



' ' The three specimens taken by my 



friend and myself, weighed (by estima- 

 tions) six, five and four pounds respec- 

 tively. The bait is surf -bugs or sand- 

 fleas, such as are used occasionally on 

 the Jersey coast for sheepshead when 

 that capricious fish declines his ordinary 

 diet. They are taken in the same 

 manner as there, by a scoop or net, or 

 digging with the fingers, when the 

 breaker recedes. 



"The cast — two hooks No. 7 O'- 

 Shaughnessy, above a small sinker and 

 one foot apart — is made seventy feet or 

 more from the boat, along a sandbar, 

 on the rising tide. Three inches of 

 water on the top of the bar are prefer- 

 able, but the day I was fishing was at 

 the tail end of a ' norther, ' and I had to 

 fish the shallow channels next the bar 

 in three or four feet of water. The 

 strike is a slow nibble or mumble, and 

 it requires quickness and discretion to 

 hook the fish. But when he is hooked, 

 which is by a sudden, slight motion of 

 the wrist, the aspect of the contest 

 changes from apathy to fierce activity. 

 There is a lightning-like run of perhaps 

 one hundred 3'ards, then a return nearly 

 to the boat, then an equally extensive 

 run which cannot be checked, and then 

 zigzag rushes and flourishes here, there 

 and everywhere, until the fish is ex- 

 hausted, and finally lifted into the boat 

 by the line — no gaffing or other cere- 

 monial ; there is no leaping or jumping 

 — all honest fishwork, below the surface 

 and in his own element. I have taken 

 small mouth bass of similar weight and 

 length, and brook-trout not so large, 

 and they simply do not compare with 

 this fighter. There is no fish (of his 

 class) which can be named with him. 

 They are not in the same category 

 unless it be in beauty. It would be like 

 comparing snipe shooting wnth hunting 

 deer. 



