274 



FISHING IN AMERICAN WATERS. 



CHAPTER VI. 



TROLLING AMONG THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 



Here is the angler's paradise, 



A dreaming, Eden-like retreat, 

 With balmy perfume in the air, 



And wild-flowers springing at the feet. 



ALL the charms which angling for pickerel confer are sub- 

 limated and condensed into trolling among the Thousand Isl- 

 ands. The pickerel of the thousand lucent streams and rap- 

 ids, shaded by as many floral islands, are much better flavor- 

 ed than are those which dream out an indolent existence while 

 watching for frogs among the lily-pads, or darting, until they 

 wear themselves thin, after the minnows of ponds and rivers. 



The Thousand Islands extend from Cape Vincent to a few 

 miles below Alexandria Bay, or about thirty miles, and the 

 average width of river is about five miles. Imagination may 

 better picture than I can describe the hundred and fifty miles 

 of trolling and casting the fly on streams dividing picturesque 

 islands, or islets covered with greensward and enlivened by 



