THE ADVERTISING FISH. 



Several years ago, when I was living in 

 Texas, I had a somewhat unusual experience, 

 quietly remarked Mr. Wm. C. Hunter, advertis- 

 ing manager of Boyce's Big Weeklies. I am a 

 hunter by nature as well as by name, and spend a 

 considerable time in sport with tlie gun and rod. 

 On the occasion referred to I was in the Indian 

 Territory, the guest of " a squaw man" at 

 Eufala, and we started on a fishing trip in the 

 Choctaw nation. Arriving at our destination 

 we prepared to worry the festive bass. No 

 sooner did I cast than a large 5^-pound bass 

 jumped out of the water and took the hook in 

 ten minutes I landed him. I held him up to show my friend, when I noticed 

 a peculiar marking on the belly of the fish, caused by the veins showing 

 through the skin. In a moment my friend caught a bass about the same 

 size and similarly marked. Upon looking at the strange marking we 

 found the veins formed the letters B pW. We tried in vain to solve the 

 meaning of the veins and started to fish again, and in three hours we 

 caught ninety- three bass, every one marked the same as the first two. I 

 never solved the enigma until about three years ago I told the story to Mr. 

 Boyce, and he smilingly informed me that the letters represented the words : 

 Blade, Ledger, World — Best Paying Weeklies. I saw the connection at a 

 glance. 



Mr. Boyce is up to all new schemes for advertising, and I would like 

 to know whether he "fixed " the advertising fish, or whether it was simply 

 a freak of nature, calling the attention of sportsmen to a well-known fact 

 among advertisers. 



A LIVELY SPIRIT OF SPIRIT LAKE. 



I once had quite a severe fright while fishing by moonlight on Spirit 

 Lake, Iowa. I was usually quite successful in night fishing, and as my 

 business kept me from enjoying the sport during the day time, I nearly 

 always devoted a few hours each evening to angling, said Mr. C. E. Ray- 

 mond, of Chicago. On the night referred to, a large fish — apparently — 

 seized the hook, and then began the most remarkable struggle I ever ex- 

 perienced. Sometimes the creature was out of the water, sailing along with 

 flapping wings of fins for a distance of fifteen or twenty yards, when it 

 would dive again, all the time making the most vigorous attempts to 



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