THE PERCH. 311 



Sussex county, New Jersey, and to some of the north 

 eastern streams and ponds of Pennsylvania, I should say 

 that late in the autumn 



When the maple boughs are crimson, 



And the hickory shines like gold, 

 And the noons are sultry hot, 



And the nights are frosty cold ; 



They bite with greater freedom, show more sport, and 

 are better on the table than at any other season of the 

 year. 



The yellow perch is a bold, nay ! a savage biter, and 

 a greedy feeder ; it is even recorded of him that he has 

 been known to strike at his own eye, casually torn out 

 by the point of the hook, which is to me by no means 

 incredible. 



Securely weaponed by the sharp palisade of arrowy 

 spines bristling along his back, and by the stout jagged 

 thorns protruding in advance of his ventral anal fins, 

 when of any considerable size, he fears neither the 

 tremendous rush and shark-like jaws of the savage mas- 

 calonge, nor the terrible agility and dauntless daring of 

 the namaycush and siskawity, those vast lake trouts, but 

 feeds himself, a lesser tyrant of the waters, on whatever 

 crosses his path of havoc. 



A light, stiff, ten-foot rod, with a small reel, and 

 twenty-five or thirty yards of line, with a small cork 

 float, and a proper sinker for bottom fishing, is the best 



