THE SMALL GAME FISHES 127 



floating offshore, and can cast and see the harlequin 

 of the seas play to the galleries and leap as well. 



It is impossible to mention all the small game fishes 

 of this region in so limited a space. Sometimes when 

 you troll off the mouths of cafions, a big wide fish will 

 fly up with your line in a curious undulating move- 

 ment, and after an extraordinary fight during which 

 you guess it a yellowtail or a white sea bass, it comes 

 in a halibut, — first cousin to the little sand dab or 

 flounder, who flattens himself on sandy bottoms and 

 imitates them in color; whose eye travels around the 

 side of the head in infancy to reach the top in mature 

 life. Amid all these fishes the scarlet Garibaldi is a 

 shining mark, not to be caught on hook and line. 

 Nor is the strange kelp-fish, which lives in the weed, 

 standing among the leaves on its head, mimicking 

 them to a remarkable extent. 



There are many more small fishes of much interest 

 here, which are not game, yet have an important 

 bearing upon the fishing. One is the smelt, an impor- 

 tant bait fish, which is sometimes taken with the 

 Japanese hooks. Another, the flying-fish, is the natural 

 food of the leaping tuna and the bonne bouche of the 

 white sea bass and yellowtail. It is eighteen inches 

 long, weighs a pound and a half, and has four 

 winglike fins, by which it can soar an eighth of a 

 mile. Its "flying" is soaring. The screw-like tail, 

 with long lower lobe, is whirled about, sending the 

 fish into the air where, with four fins set or locked, 

 it becomes an animate aeroplane. When the inertia 

 is exhausted the tail drops, hits the water, where it 

 violently whirls about sending the fish into the air 

 again. In this way it tries to escape the tuna. The 



