80 THE TARPON 



break water and go bounding away with their tackle, while 

 they gazed upon it with envious eyes. But, apparently, its cap- 

 ture by rod and reel was never considered a possibility. It was 

 taken by harpoon or on hand lines precisely as the big shark 

 is now captured. 



In an article written in 1876 on the Game Fish of Florida, 

 S. C. Clarke, the noted angler, said : 



"The tarpum I have not seen. It also is rare and is de- 

 scribed to belong to the mackerel family, growing to the 

 weight of 80 to 100 pounds. A surface fish, very active 

 and strong, with brilliant silvery scales the size of a dol- 

 lar. It is rarely taken with hook and line, as it generally 

 carries away the tackle, however strong. It goes in schools 

 and leaps from the water when struck, either with hook or 

 spear. The only successful way of killing the tarpum, I 

 am told, is to strike it with a harpoon, to which is attached, 

 by a strong line, a small empty cask ; the fish by struggling 

 with this buoy, exhausts itself so that it may be approach- 

 ed in a boat and killed with a lance." 



In an article on fishes written in 1884, it is said : 



''Imagine a herring-shaped fish, five or six feet long, 

 with brilliant silvery scales the size of a half a dollar, in 

 schools of a dozen or twenty, leaping from the blue surface 

 of a summer sea. This is all that the angler usually sees 

 of the tarpon. Sometimes one of these glittering, rushing 

 monsters takes the hook. What follows? The line runs 

 out with great speed till it has all left the reel, when it 

 parts at its weakest point, and the fish goes off leaping 

 seaward. When hooked on a handline similar results fol- 

 low. No man is strong enough to hold a large tarpon un- 

 less he is provided with a drag or buoy in the shape of an 

 empty keg attached to the line which may retard or even 

 stop the fish after a while. The tarpon is sometimes taken 

 with a harpoon or seines." 



