"We would NOT!" shouted a man in the back of 

 the room. 



"Jealous," said Muhlhausen. 



"Would you believe me, I baited that hook with a 



minnow," 



"Whereja get the minnow?" came the interruption. 



"Out of a pail," said Muhlhausen. Then he con- 

 tinued, "I sat on the front porch and flew that kite 

 out over the lake, let go the string and dropped the 

 minnow right over in the middle of the lake. I bet 

 you the bass that jumped for the bait went up in the 

 air nearly twenty feet and grabbed the minnow, hook 

 and all. I hauled in the kite and that bass with it, 

 and he weighed six pounds. He was THAT long. 

 I flew the kite out six times and each time I brought 

 in a bass. I figured I had about enough for a good 

 mess, for each fish weighed from four to eight pounds. 

 1 tried again, and that time I had a bass that must 

 have weighed between ten and eleven pounds, but 

 by this time the ugly cuss who owned the lake saw 

 what I was doing. He came out with a rifle, and 

 just as I got the bass up over his pasture he shot 

 and cut the string which carried the bass. It fell on 

 dry land and he went over and picked it up. He 

 swung it around and put his thumb up to his nose 

 and wiggled his fingers at me. It's a pretty blamed 

 mean man that will steal a chap's fish that way isn't 

 it?" 



"How much did that last bass weigh?" said the 

 interrupter. 



"Somewhere between eighteen and twenty pounds," 

 said Muhlhausen. 



"How large was the box kite?" some on asked. 

 "I don't remember," said Muhlhausen. 



127 



