FISHING AT HOME AND ABROAD 



not to be eaten by any epicure more fastidious than a turkey-buzzard, 

 should not be killed. They may, if necessary, be measured alive and then 

 given their liberty, at any rate after one or two have been retained as 

 trophies. Nor should the sportsman kill undersized fish of any kind, 

 unless, like dogfish, weevers and some others, they are noxious vermin. 

 The myriads of undersized flatfish killed by amateurs are a disgrace to 

 sport, and it is even worse to keep undersized bass, mullet and pollack, 

 since these fish give such splendid sport when full grown. La Fontaine 

 may have been a fine writer, but he was a woundy poor sportsman, else 

 he could never have written that miserable fable of his on the " Fisherman 

 and the Little Fish," in which the latter stoutly declines to return an under- 

 sized fish to the water, to grow bigger, on the ground that — 



Mais le l&cher en attendant, 



Je tiens pour mot que c'est folie; 



Car de le rattraper il n'est pas trap certain. 



Such doctrine is poisonous. 



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