246 Big Game Fishes 



in ten minutes after reaching the Pass I was 

 playing my first Texas tarpon ; and of six boats 

 which made up the party, all had fish or strikes 

 soon after reaching the ground. I fished with a 

 rod eight and a half feet long, a twenty-one cutty- 

 hunk line, using a large tuna reel of Edwin vom 

 Hofe make, containing six hundred feet of line, a 

 Van Vleck hook with a three-foot phosphor- 

 bronzed wire leader, or snell, the boatman doub- 

 ling the line for about a foot beyond this. The 

 bait was a live mullet not over four inches in 

 length, hooked through the lips, and with thirty 

 feet of line out I began fishing. 



My boatman rowed slowly along the jetty, not 

 ten feet distant, where the water was shallow. 

 The tide was slack, the water smooth in the 

 channel, but breaking heavily on either side. 

 That tarpons were plentiful was evident, as every 

 few minutes the back of one would be seen ; and 

 as the boatman rowed out beyond the jetty I had 

 my first strike, and with the best of luck hooked 

 my fish. Up into the air four or five feet went a 

 splendid mass of molten silver, to fall with a 

 crash, only to go up again, this time tossing the 

 bait at me with such force that it fell on the 

 gunwale. As the fish reached the surface, it 



