Preface 



XI 



good [as], if not better than, the rod and reel kind." 

 (Wandering Angler, New York Press, Aug. 17, 1915.) 



Hand-line fishing, as fishing, though the Tuna 

 Angling Club, of Santa Catalina Island, California, is 

 bound to the use of light rods and fine reels and tells 

 us hand-lines are unsportsmanlike and detrimental 

 to the public -interest, is good (Christ and His dis- 

 ciples sanctioned it), but to say it is as good as or 

 better than rod and reel angling is not convincing. 

 The indifferent fisher can't condemn angling in 

 praising common fishing with any more reason than 

 he might proclaim against cricket playing in favoring 

 carpentry, or vice versa. One might as correctly say 

 hand-line fishing is as good as riding, or driving, or 

 golf, or baseball, or canoeing (of course it is), for 

 fishing without rod and reel and fishing with proper 

 tackle are pursuits as distinct in character as riding a 

 plain horse bareback with a rough halter, and strad- 

 dling a gallant charger with neat bridle and saddle ; or 

 as mere boating upon a refuse creek, and skimming 

 the green billows in a trim yacht. 



That the fisher's hand-line and the fisherman's 

 net will take more fish than the Angler's tackle is 

 not of moment, because a stick of dynamite or a 

 cannon filled with leaden pellets or a boy with a 

 market basket will take still more fish than the net and 

 hand-line. Quantity makes fishing "good" with the 

 fisherman; quality delights the Angler. There is no 

 objection to the mere fish-getter filling his boat with 

 fishes with or without tackle, but as the jockey is sepa- 

 rated from the sportsman rider and the sailor from 

 the yachtsman so should the quantity fisher and the 

 quality Angler be considered in contrasting spheres. 

 "What a man brings home in his heart after fishing 



