378 BOOK OF THE BLACK BASS. 



of Salmon and Trout fishers; for I would not, even here, 

 put Black Bass in a stream inhabited by Salmon or Brook 

 Trout, 



While watching the plebeian interlopers sporting in an 

 eddy, their bristling spines and emerald sides gleaming in 

 the sunshine, I hear an awful voice from the adjacent 

 rocks exclaiming: "Fools rush in where angels fear to 

 tread ! " Shade of Izaak Walton defend us ! While ap- 

 pealing to Father Izaak for protection, I quote his words : 

 "Of which, if thou be a severe, sour complexioned man, 

 then I here disallow thee to be a competent judge. 7 ' 



Seriously, most of our notions of game fish and fishing 

 are derived from British writers; and as the Salmon and 

 the Trout are the only fishes in Great Britain worthy of 

 being called game, they, of course, form the themes of 

 British writers on game fish. Americans, following the 

 lead of our British cousins in this, as we were wont to do 

 in all sporting matters, have eulogized the Salmon and 

 Brook Trout as the game fish par excellence of America, 

 ignoring other fish equally worthy. 



While some claim for the Striped Bass a high place in 

 the list of game fish, I feel free to assert, that, were the 

 Black Bass a native of Great Britain, he would rank fully 

 as high, in the estimation of British anglers, as either the 

 Trout or the Salmon. I am borne out in this by the 

 opinions of British sportsmen, whose statements have been 

 received without question. 



W. H. Herbert (Frank Forester) writing of the Black 

 Bass, says : " This is one of the finest of the American 

 fresh water fishes ; it is surpassed by none in boldness 

 of biting, in fierce and violent resistance when hooked, and 

 by a very few only in excellence upon the board." 



