THE BASSES: FRES H-W ATER AND MARINE 



a straight- jacket when they go a-fishing! Some 

 old fellows won't let you whisper in the boat, and 

 are as querulous and overcautious as my grand- 

 father was whenever he had an attack of the gout. 

 He would lie flat on his back in bed, with his gouty 

 foot propped up on a pillow laid across a chair, 

 placed bottom upward, and in this position would 

 centre and strain his eyes and fears upon the knob 

 of the chamber door, which was no sooner turned 

 than he would cry out with prospective pain, 

 * Watch out for my foot.' 



" It is just so with these bait-fishers. A motion 

 of your lip, although voiceless, and they would cry 

 out, if they dared, ' Watch out for my coming 

 bite ! ' They are right in thinking that the least 

 motion of the boat is apt to frighten the fish, but 

 6 1 won't go home till morning,' by a dozen bass 

 voices, is less disturbing to a pool or a bank than 

 the twisting of a toe on the bottom of a boat." 



The Doctor continued: " A fish can see in water, 

 but not when out of it. The shadow of a split- 

 bamboo rod thrown across a pool will create in a 

 fish the same skittishness as would be caused by 

 an elephant browsing upon the bank. 



" A passing cloud over a shallow and pellucid 

 pool protects the angler, and puts another fin or 

 two in his creel, where, a moment before, each cast 

 drove the fish to deeper pools or behind protect- 

 ing rocks." 



104 



