THE ANGLER'S GUIDE 67 



bunched on the ground instead of chivalricly bagging 

 single birds on the wing with a pertinent arm. 



The neophyte always confounds the angler with the 

 indiscriminate fisherman and so implicates the angler in 

 the cruelty and wastefulness associated with mere chance 

 fishing, when in fact the angler is the real propagator and 

 protector of the fishes, and is in no sense cruel or wasteful. 



The laws that prohibit greedy catches, and protect the 

 mother fish in breeding time are made by, enforced by and 

 supported financially by the angler. 



The rearing of the fishes that are placed in depleted 

 waters was originated by, is conducted by, and is paid 

 for by the angler. 



No other class has earnestly bothered its head, honestly 

 lifted its hands or liberally opened its purse in these 

 matters, and the nearest association man in general has 

 with the preservation of both wild fish and fowl is 

 in uttering a cowardly, false accusation against the one 

 who really deserves sole credit for the work, the sportsman, 

 the genuine field sportsman, not the vicious sporting man 

 of the race track, cock pit and gambling den two distinct 

 species of animal, as vastly separated in character as the 

 deerhound and the dragon. 



And why this charge against the innocent? Simply 

 because the guilty wish to shield and profit themselves, 

 as the thief cries fire that he may pick your pocket in the 

 panic that ensues. 



But then there is a well meaning but wholly unenlight- 

 ened element, that, influenced by the cry of the methodical 

 spoiler, ignorantly condemns the honest man the really 

 humane men and women who are sincere in their con- 

 demnation but totally ignorant of their subject. 



One of this sort, an estimable woman in public life, 

 loudly preaches against the chase and is all the time draw- 

 ing dividends that provide her with the means to indulge 

 in the vulgarest and cruelest of fashionable extravagances 

 among them the wool of the unborn lamb, furs from 

 the backs of fast-disappearing quadrupeds, and feathers 

 of the farmers' most valuable insect-destroying song birds 

 and these wicked dividends derived from several acid factor- 

 ies, a gas house, a power plant and a dye works that have 

 not only killed off the trillions of fishes in several rivers 

 but destroyed forever the very habitat of the species ! 



Another of this sort is well exemplified in the character 

 of an old gentleman in Pennsylvania who loudly proclaims 

 against trout fishing, but who utterly ruins nearly eight 

 miles of trout water, once the home of thousands of lordly 

 fish, by permitting his mill hands to run off sawdust in 

 the streams. 



This poor, ignorant soul objects to you and me chivalricly 

 taking half a dozen specimens on the fly catching the 

 cunning trout with an imitation of the living thing itself 

 destroys by the thousands for food -and play while he 

 mercilessly slaughters the entire immediate supply, and 



