Trout-Fishing in the Ratigetey Lakes. 357 



of Dixfield, now one of the efficient commissioners of fisheries for 

 the State of Maine, organized an expedition to penetrate to the lakes 

 from the upper end. Twenty years before, Mr. Stanley's father had 

 made the survey of much of the lake country, and, discovering the 

 extraordinary size of the trout, had frequently repeated his visits. 



UI'l'KK DAM. 



The son now and then accompanied his father on these trips, and 

 with such a preceptor in the gentle art, and with such opportunties 

 for its practice, it is not strange that Mr. Stanley should have 

 achieved the distinction of being the champion fly-fisher of the world. 

 His record of brook-trout weighing from three to nine and a half 

 pounds, all taken with the fly, reaches many hundred. The party 

 which Mr. Stanley headed on the occasion alluded to made its way 

 to the lake, via Dixfield, Carthage,. Weld, Phillips, and Madrid, 

 striking first the upper end of Rangeley. One of its members, Mr. 

 George Shepard Page, of New York City, was so delighted with 

 his experience upon this trip that in 1863 he made a second journey 

 by the same route. He returned from this trip, bringing with him 

 eight brook-trout weighing respectively 8jMi, 8^, J%> 6}4, 6, $*4, 

 5, 5 — total, 5 1 Ji lbs., or an average of nearly b x /i lbs. each. William 

 Cullen Bryant, Henry J. Raymond, and George Wilkes were pre- 



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