NORTHERN INLAND FISHES. 289 



to be discouraged. But I had been bantered with the prediction 

 that I would give up at dinner time, and so for mere pluck's sake 

 I stood to, or rather sat upon, my post. At noon I ate my lunch, 

 and having some bits left cast them lazily down on the water. 

 Ver}' soon, and unexpectedly, there was a break in the surface, and 

 an enormous mascalonge showed his full length near a bread crust. 

 While he was studying the looks of the crust I gave him the com- 

 pliments of my rifle. Instantly upon his beginning to flurry, there 

 appeared around him a number of others, all large, and for a mo- 

 ment they waged a fierce attack upon their wounded fellow ; but 

 when I had loaded and discharged my gun again they disappeared. 

 By this time my man in the skiff came up, and after picking up the 

 two fish received me also, and I rested upon my honors the balance 

 of the day. The first of these two pike was the one alluded to 

 above, weighing fifty-one pounds. But though I perched on that 

 pile several times afterward, like a hawk where he once caught a 

 chicken, I never had another shot from my eyrie. 



" Still-baiting for this fish is not as successful as for the glass- 

 eyed pike and pickerel. Only the smaller ones are generally 

 caught thus, the larger requiring more action in the bait in order 

 to challenge their speed and pugnacity, and induce them to bite. 



" Fishing through the ice is an interesting method of taking our 

 game. But it is like pickerel ice fishing, in which a hook baited 

 with a small minnow is cast through a hole and the other end of 

 the line tied to a twig stuck in the snow. Snch a mode would 

 avail for mascalonge about as a mouse trap for a wolf. A hole 

 two feet across is cut through the ice, and above it is erected a 

 close tent or cabin to shut out the light. The fisherman seats him- 

 self so as to conveniently look and use the gaff through the hole, 

 and find the water clear below while he is in the dark above. Both 

 the gaff and a silver decoy, attached to a wire three feet long, are 

 lowered into the water. The former is held motionless in the right 

 hand, while with the other hand the decoy is moved around as if it 

 were a real minnow. When the pike discovers the decoy, he slowly 

 and threateningly glides forward to investigate. The fisherman 

 will discover him when several feet distant, and here is where the 

 excitement begins. He steals along like an Argus, now straight 

 on, now sidewise, stopping every few inches to take notes, rapacity 



