192 Big Game Fishes 



into a heavy-breaking sea farther out. We picked 

 up a few small bass by casting up-stream, using 

 pipe-sinkers, but in a marvellously short space of 

 time the bait and sinker would pass the boat and 

 lie at the surface. Several sharks followed up 

 the mullet trail and afforded some sport. The 

 shad fisherman, who had never seen a five-foot 

 shark killed with a line of that size, confidentially 

 informed me that " he'd have been dogged ef he'd 

 'a' b'l'eved it, ef he hadn't seen it." 



Gradually the current slackened, and then sud- 

 denly my reel gave tongue, and in a few seconds 

 I was engaged in sport that was sufficiently excit- 

 ing to satisfy the most exacting angler. Out into 

 the midstream the fish went in a splendid run, 

 having all its own way, the tackle being too light 

 for any immediate protest, and it was two hundred 

 feet distant before the thumb brake began its 

 deadly work and I turned it. Then it shot across 

 the water in the opposite direction, never slacking 

 or giving up. Now the reel would gain twenty or 

 thirty feet, and the gamy fish would spring forward 

 and turn downward, sounding with an impetuosity 

 that was irresistible, making everything hum with 

 the soul-stirring zip-zip-zip ! of the reel, which so 

 truly echoes the exact movement of the stricken 



