FISHERMAN'S LUCK 125 



She fell to the ground, and fluttered around me 

 as if her wings were broken. ' Look ! ' she seemed 

 to say, 'I am bigger than that poor little baby. 

 If you must eat something, eat me ! My wing is 

 lame, I can't fly. You can easily catch me. Let 

 that little bird go ! ' And so I did ; and the whole 

 family disappeared in the bushes as if by magic." 



Mr. Rudyard Kipling, in a letter to the editor 

 of the Fishing Gazette a few months ago, in a 

 reply to a previous suggestion that he had taken 

 Pacific Coast salmon with the fly, said : " In the 

 language of the immortal Jorrocks, spoon ! spoon ! 

 spoon ! 'Fly' is a slip of the rod. Those brutes 

 won't rise to it." Still the question, " Do Salmon 

 take the Fly in Salt Water ? " is an open question. 



Mr. Van Dyke was once fishing on a fair little 

 river, the P'tit Saguenay, with two friends, who had 

 done all that could be done to secure sport, but 

 the weather was " dour " and the water " drumly," 

 and every day the lumbermen sent a "drive" of 

 ten thousand spruce logs rushing down the flooded 

 stream. Not having seen a salmon for four days, 

 they went down into the tide water of the greater 

 Saguenay. 



"There, in the salt water, where men say the 

 salmon never take the fly, H. E. G , fishing with 

 a small trout rod, a poor, short line, and an ancient 

 Red Ibis of the common kind, rose and hooked a 

 lordly salmon of at least 35 Ibs. Was not this 

 pure luck ? . . . Four times that great fish leaped 

 into the air ; twice he suffered the pliant reed to 



