Tarpon Fishing in Mexico. 



JD 



doubts concerning some of my fishy tales : but '• so strong armed 

 am I in honesty " that even the well-known comparison, liar, 



d d Har, fisherman, passes by me as the idle wind. However, I 



no man's reputation could stand this sort of thint^, so 1 sent the ' 



following" letter to that mendacious newspaper : — 



" Sir, as you have done me the honour to mention my name 

 in your paper and as no Englishman would wish to raise a feeling ' 



of envy in the breast of any of his American cousins, I should like 

 to correct one or two inaccuracies in your story. You suggest 

 that my bait which had been dead some hours, terrified at the 

 approach of tarpon No. i, wriggled its way up my line ; that this 

 agility and cunning availed it nothing as it was immediately 

 devoured by tarpon No. 2. who succeeded in tying himself 

 securely to the line : that tarpon No. i. mad with chagrin at the 

 success of his ri\al, promptly impaled himself on the bare hook, 

 and that then the sportsman landed the two. The prose of the 

 incident is as follows. Tarpon No. i took the bait, and discovering 

 some uncanny peculiarities in connection with it, lea[)t, aiul to put 

 it vulgarly, expectorated, but failed to get rid of the hook. The 

 small mullet instead of being hurled away as usual, was thrown j 



some 30 feet up the line, which then passed through its mouth ' 



and gills. It was thus being dragged about in the water some- ' 



thing after the manner of a drojj fly. A second tar[)on seized ( 



it, and for a few seconds both hsh were on, l)ut they almost \ 



immediately tired of my society and severed all connection with 

 the sportsman, who instead of landing the two lost a hook and { 



many yards of line." 



With regard to cost ; hoia, bait and boatman should come to 



c 2 



