368 Big Game Fisbes 



the boat, and as suddenly plunge down to sulk 

 in angry protest and apparently present its broad 

 surface against the rod, making the turning of 

 the reel almost an impossibility. 



Slowly the boatman rowed out of the surf, and 

 if this fish could have been played in water as 

 shallow as that familiar to the salmon angler, 

 where its rushes would have been off instead of 

 down, it would have commended itself to the 

 ardent lover of purely game fishes. For fifteen 

 minutes it fought me, and until I brought it 

 within eyesight, my boatman insisted that it was a 

 yellowtail one of the most powerful and hard- 

 est fighting of all fishes ; but it was a halibut, one 

 of the despised flounder tribe which appeal to 

 the digestion but not to an appetite whetted for 

 sport. This gamy creature redoubled its fighting 

 as it saw the boat, repeatedly broke away, and 

 when gaffed was making a flying rush around the 

 boat after various attempts to hold it ; and when 

 finally held, its white belly blazing in the sun- 

 light, beat the water with powerful blows, and 

 literally hurled watery defiance in our faces. 

 When the boatman held the fish up, that I might 

 observe its fine proportions, it was evident that it 

 was built for such work and was an animated 



