54 HASTINGS LAKE. 



down and discovered the largest dog otter I have ever 

 seen firmly hooked through my waders into the flesh, 

 struggling like a very demon to free himself, and ap- 

 parently as scared as I was myself at the novelty of 

 the situation. 



I attempted to scramble up the steep sides of the 

 pool with my captive, but was so flurried and scared 

 that little headway was made. My waders were full 

 of water, and this and the weight of the otter made it 

 hard work for me to obtain any secure hold. How- 

 ever, after what seemed to me to be hours, I managed 

 to crawl and cling to the slippery rocky slope clear of 

 the water, but could get no farther, having by this 

 time, b'y the combined efforts of my fright and scram- 

 ble, become pretty well exhausted. Just at this critical 

 moment the snell broke, leaving one set of hooks in 

 my leg, and the other in the otter, who dropped into the 

 water with a loud splash and disappeared immediately. 

 Rid of my burden, with much labor I managed to crawl 

 to a more secure resting-place. 



I took off my waders and found that such was the 

 force of the struggle the strong Mackintosh of iny 

 waders had been torn some three inches down, and the 

 hook was so deeply imbedded in the flesh that, instead 

 of resorting to the old method of turning the barb out- 

 ward and bringing the shank through after it, I had to 

 cut quite deep into the flesh to extricate it, making 

 quite a good sized wound. However, I stopped the 

 bleeding with some tobacco leaves, and limped home, 

 wondering whether it was possible that I could ever 

 meet with a more strange happening than that which 

 had just occurred. 



