CHAPTER XXIX 



ON THE TRAIL OF THE WHITE SEA BASS 



DOWN in the Gulf of California, not far from 

 the mouth of the Colorado River, the tide 

 sets into the bays in a small bore, filling them 

 very rapidly and running out a long distance. When 

 the tide waves come in they are followed by a splendid 

 game fish which the not over-observant angler might 

 easily take for a salmon. It weighs from eight to one 

 hundred and twenty-five or more pounds, and resembles 

 a large salmon, — so much so that once when I stood 

 above a great salmon pool on the St. Lawrence I 

 could not divest myself of the idea that the splendid 

 fishes darting about were the white sea bass of the 

 Sea of Cortez, as the Gulf of California was originally 

 named. 



The weight of these fishes is here given at one hun- 

 dred and twenty-five pounds, but an old fisherman and 

 gaffer who accompanied the writer for many years 

 stated that he had seen them so large that they aver- 

 aged two hundred pounds, and Mr. C. G. Conn took 

 monsters weighing one hundred and fifty pounds, with 

 rod and reel. The fish abound in these waters in vast 

 numbers. An acquaintance of mine, interested in 

 mines in the vicinity of San Gorgas, took down some 

 tackle, and, standing on the beach, cast into the tide 

 waves as they came in, and had what he termed the 

 sport of his life. He was an old salmon fisherman, and 



