160 SNAPPING MACKEREL. 



dressed on gut, is attached. As the teeth of these vora- 

 cious fish are sharp, and after being hooked they snap 

 continually, the silk whipping of the hook, as well as the 

 gut itself, is soon bitten through. Either a small quill 

 may be slipped down over the hook before it is attached, 

 and into this the teeth sink without damage, or care must 

 be taken to put a couple of half hitches with the snell 

 over the shank, as the whipping wears out. 



A light rod and reel are necessary for this sport, and 

 there is the same skill and excitement in the repeated 

 casts that lend to striped bass fishing one of its peculiar 

 charms. The morning hours, the last of the ebb and first 

 of the flood, are the most propitious times ; but as the 

 Fall advances, any hour, tide or place will furnish sport 

 in abundance. 



I was once fishing with a friend whose experience is 

 greater with the pencil than the rod, on one of those 

 glorious evenings of what might be properly styled in 

 our country " fiery brown October," and our success 

 made us unmindful of the fleeting hours that had bid the 

 sun farewell and welcomed the moon from her bed. 

 Cramped as we had been in a cockle-shell of a boat, we 

 had taken one of the thwarts and the oars, and placing 

 them across the gunwale, had made two high but dan- 

 gerous seats. The boat was extremely unsteady, and 

 many and solemn had been my unheeded warnings to 

 move as little as possible, and to exercise care in what- 

 ever motions were unavoidably necessary. The fish were 

 out in force, and seized our bait frantically the instant it 

 touched waves, over which the moonlight glanced in 

 tiny ripples. A northeaster had been blowing, but, dying 



