430 Salmon -Fishing. 



the fish lie, and how quickest to aid you to circumvent and kill them. 

 The Gaspe men can give even the best of anglers a valuable hint 

 occasionally, which it is quite safe to follow, as it often saves a fish. 

 They come from that good old stock, Scotch- English, and are as 

 true as steel. Money and jewelry were safer in our camps than at 

 home in the way of our servants. They never touch a drop of 

 liquor, and work faithfully from morning till night. Even after long 

 and tedious hours of poling up rapid streams, under a hot sun, they 

 are ready to anticipate your slightest wish. All the men ask for, 

 beside fish, is pork, hard bread, sugar, and black tea. Without the 

 latter they are good for nothing. They make the tea in the tea- 

 kettle itself, and drink several large tincupfuls at a sitting. Follow- 

 ing this by a five minutes' pull at a pipeful of navy plug tobacco, 

 they are ready for work. 



In favorable seasons, the Big Salmon Hole of the York is good for 

 two or three fish daily ; and as Lazell was unable to walk by reason 

 of cooling too rapidly after our twelve-mile walk, it seemed best to 

 leave to him the exclusive use of this and the other pools near House 

 No. 2. On Wednesday, therefore, I set out for the Narrows, near 

 which are the last and best pools of the river, leaving two men to 

 come with the canoe and luggage, and taking one with me. We 

 arrived before noon, and, after lunch, carefully inspected the pools. 

 By crawling quietly to the edge of low cliffs, or climbing trees, we 

 could count the fish by scores, lying quietly behind small stones or 

 just at the edge of the current, with heads up-stream. At first, one 

 unaccustomed to it only sees large numbers of dark, smooth stones, 

 as he expresses it ; but soon a little wavy motion of the lower end of 

 the object is seen, and you find that they are all salmon, only the 

 dark backs being visible as you look down upon them. They rest in 

 these pools for several days, to gain strength for leaping the falls 

 just above. Often one hundred and fifty have been counted in the 

 lower or long pool at the Narrows, and frequently not more than a 

 single one will take the fly. 



The matter of taking a fly seems to be one of sheer sport. It is 

 a well established fact that salmon eat nothing during the several 

 months they remain in the rivers. Before entering the Gaspe streams 

 they gorge themselves with capelin, a small fish resembling our smelt. 

 Quite often fish which we killed at the lowest pools had undigested 



