Big Game at Sea 



mouths of canons along shore. The bonitas and true 

 tunas are on the surface, the latter often moving along 

 in schools in an acute angle with a large tuna in the 

 lead, fins and tail projecting above the surface, when 

 it is an easy matter to cast a bait in front of them. 

 Deeper, but not far from the surface, lies the albacore, 

 and at times the big tuna, and almost invariably the 

 " yellow-finned tuna," which in the rush upward after 

 the prey is often the last, coming up out of the depths 

 flashing white, green and gold scintillating with color, 

 a radiant object. 



The conditions on these Pacific fishing grounds are 

 ideal. The island affords smooth water, though 

 twenty or thirty miles out at sea the water is deep, 

 blue as sapphire, the sky clear and bright, the tem- 

 perature almost always cool and delightful, while the 

 island with its high mountains, its rocky and pre- 

 cipitous cliffs affords a charming relief to the eye. 



Slowly the launch with its comfortable seats in the 

 stern moves along the kelp beds, the highway of the 

 fishes, where groves and forests of giant weed rise in 

 the deep blue water and roll and bend in the tide, 

 forming halls and portieres of great beauty through 

 which countless fishes swim and poise. 



Often the game is here; again off shore, where the 

 sea is a vast sapphire, a blue so intense that it appears 

 to be the very sky reflected in the waters. The line 

 is out sixty feet or so and at the end of the long 

 leader or snood a silvery sardine gleams and flashes 



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