The Fishes of our Boyhood 103 



ing through brush and up and down wooded banks. 

 Sometimes gunner or spearman would chase the 

 watery sign, losing and finding it again and again 

 for a couple of miles, and then fail to get a good 

 chance at the fish. 



Not a few of the old hands at this work had 

 favorite points where they would perch themselves 

 like overgrown kingfishers and wait for fish to 

 pass. This method demanded much patience, and 

 it had a disadvantage in the fact that fish might be 

 playing beyond the bends above and below and the 

 watcher not know it. As a rule, the odds were in 

 favor of the man who cautiously stole along the 

 bank and kept a keen eye upon the water ahead. 

 During the best part of a morning, he could cover 

 several miles of stream and, perhaps, have as many 

 as three or four chances. 



In practised hands the long-handled spear did 

 excellent service, but woe was the portion of the 

 duffer who attempted to use one. Badly scared 

 fish and a much-astonished mortal were the almost 

 certain results of clumsy work, and fish once scared 

 seldom gave another chance that day. Many of 

 the country lads used cheap rifles, which were all 

 right where the opposite banks were sufficiently high 

 to stop glancing balls, but still there remained the 

 chance of a ball speeding somewhere upon a danger- 

 ous errand. A rifleball glancing from water, or an 

 unnoticed trunk, or bough, is a peril to the end of 

 its flight, because it may strike creature or object at 

 an apparently impossible distance to one side of the 

 original line of fire. Knowing this, the fisherman, 

 as every man should be, was extremely careful. 



