THE AMBER FISH 343 



hold the rod across your knee, your thumb resting on 

 the leather pad or thumb stall which forms the brake, 

 and revel in the scenery — the beauties of the bay, 

 the mountains that climb into the air, the deep shadows 

 of the cliffs. All at once the click gives out a brazen 

 note, a sort of z-e-e-e-e-e-e! You close your thumb on 

 the brake, are alert on the moment, and see the really 

 splendid rush this yellowtail makes. You may have 

 caught salmon, but this fish can drown a salmon of 

 twice its weight. You may have taken bluefish, or 

 drum, or weakfish, but you never experienced before 

 just this kind of thrill that the t3^ical twenty-five- 

 pound yellowtail in good fighting trim gives you as he 

 garners one hundred and fifty feet of line. After a 

 while you stop him. The boatman has thrown off 

 the engine, and you are now introduced to a real 

 game fish. I am not going to anticipate your pleasure 

 by describing all the sensations of the sport, or 

 the methods of the yellowtail, but he will give you 

 the play of your life, and every once in a while 

 comes the vicious z-e-e-e-e! as he makes a rush which 

 nothing can withstand. Then, when you bring 

 him up and he circles around the boat, never giving 

 up, bearing off, if you really need him, the gaffer 

 slips the gaff under him and lifts him, still fighting, 

 into the boat. You then see that his back, which 

 was green in the water, is now a splendid sapphire 

 blue. 



Yellowtail fishing when the fish are large and biting 

 is, to use the term that has been frayed to a frazzle, 

 "strenuous sport"; there is no other word that just 

 describes it. The fish bites so readily that it is 

 manifestly unfair to use anything but the fine tackle 



