122 The Atlantic Salmon 



the river every season, in his own water and that 

 of others, who did not always know when he was 

 there. When Alford hooked a salmon he would 

 throw overboard a buoy attached to his anchor, 

 stand up in his canoe, rod in one hand, and in the 

 other a pole with which he pushed the canoe 

 toward shore until he reached shoal water, where 

 he stepped out, pulled up the canoe so it would 

 not drift off, and began attending to his salmon, 

 which in the meantime had generally taken out a 

 lot of line. Alford always beached his fish, as he 

 never had any one with him, and landed very 

 many large ones in this manner, one which I saw 

 weighed being forty-five pounds. 



The length of time required to land a salmon 

 depends on several things, and not always on his 

 size, as salmon vary quite as much as men or other 

 animals in power and endurance. The various 

 works on salmon angling contain accounts of 

 many thrilling encounters with enormous salmon. 

 One of these, recounted by Couch, in " Fishes of 

 the British Islands," as having taken place on the 

 river Shannon and " from an Irish source," is worth 

 narrating. The man who hooked the fish played 

 him for five hours, during which he was worked 

 three miles down-stream. In the approaching 



