THE BLACK-FIS H. 



181 



a never-failing theme of entertainment to those who are en- 

 gaged in this sort of adventure. Though the hand line is 

 generally used, the rod is sometimes employed to great ad- 

 vantage. The black-fish is remarkable for retaining life a 

 long time after he is taken out of water. He sometimes 

 swims over even ground, and is caught in seines." 



An observant New-York amateur, who delights in black- 

 fish angling, gives us the following: 



" The black-fish, or, as he is called in the eastern states, 

 the tautog, is a very fine fish for the table, well known to all 

 epicures, and affords fine amusement to the angler. He is 

 taken on reefs or around detached rocks, where the food in 

 which he delights is found. The usual baits employed in 

 taking black-fish are the hard and soft shelled clam, the rock 

 crab and soldier crab or fiddler, shrimp and shedder lobster 

 or crab : these two last are decidedly the best that can be 

 used, though in many situations the shrimp and the two small 

 kinds of crab above named are sometimes to be preferred. 

 As a general bait for these fish, the shedder lobster is my 

 favorite, and I have long been a successful angler for these 

 fish. There is a very great difference observable in the 

 black-fish, even those feeding together at the same rock. 

 Those taken close to the rock, especially if it has shelving 

 sides, are shorter, much darker colored, and thicker than 

 those which are found playing in the edge of the tide as 

 it sweeps past the rock these are the long fish, with larger 

 heads than the others, and of much lighter color, especially 

 about the head and snout, the latter frequently being nearly 

 white, whence they are called white-noses and tide-runners. 

 They seem to delight in the eddies at the very edge of the 

 swift water, where they watch for the shrimp, or small crabs, 

 which are borne along by the tide. By casting the line a 

 little above the rock, and letting the bait float with the cur- 

 rent past it, holding the rod with an even and rendy hand 



